


Something Miraculous

by Mommy



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, and Marinette is Gabriel and Sabine's daughter, in which Adrien is Tom and Emilie's son, sub Adrien Dupain and Marinette Agreste-Cheng accordingly - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-05-03
Packaged: 2019-04-04 11:46:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 36,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14019549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mommy/pseuds/Mommy
Summary: A man he had just passed crumpled, tumbled, the sound of his cane smacking the pavement sharp against the murmur of the world around him.He could have been the only one in the road with him at the time, or no one else had noticed, but Adrien Dupain was the one who rushed to the man's side when the pedestrian light changed.





	1. Set in Stone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The daily routine he had set in stone goes awry once, and it's all downhill from there.

It was the third time that morning that Adrien had hit snooze, and he was no more motivated to pull himself from the warmth of his blanket cocoon than he was thirty minutes ago, but this was the moment of truth: he still had just enough time left to eat, get dressed, and walk to school if he got up now. If he allowed himself to curl up again, he would have to throw on whatever he could get his hands on and run to school, while maybe not having a chance to grab anything to eat on the way out, much less find the time to eat it until he got to school.  
And he would probably crush whatever he grabbed from the sheer intensity of having to run for it.  
As much as he respected students that could hold a piece of toast in their mouths during the race to school without dropping the bulk of it or crushing it, he didn't believe himself so skilled.

Decisively, he threw his sheets from his body, scooted his way across his bed to the stairs down from the loft, reached up and propped open the skylight to let out the heat that would eventually waft up into his room over the course of the day, and carried on to the kitchen, on auto-pilot the whole way.

He was glad of his choice immediately: the older Dupain marched proudly through the room with a newly-baked platter of croissants. "I started thinking you were going to be late!" Tom laughed as Adrien reached eagerly towards the platter.  
It was first come, first served, and he was always first in line to the oven, every time, even when customers were involved, and his only charge was getting crushed in a one-armed hug that he would carefully make mutual, even though his own arm didn't reach as far around his father as his father's did him, before Tom carried the rest of the croissants back towards the patisserie.

"When have I ever been late?" Adrien defended himself through an unimpressive mouthful of bread, apparently too unintelligible for Tom to make out his meaning. One big brow quirked at him before the baker disappeared to the bakery.  
Too tired to be embarrassed for himself, he all but inhaled the rest of the croissant before he headed back to his room to change from his baggy T and pyjama pants to jeans and a more size-appropriate T.  
It was an afterthought to grab something warmer in case the library was particularly cold, so he settled for whatever button-down his hand happened to snatch up on his way down through the hatch separating his room from the rest of the apartment. It was even further from his mind to grab his schoolbag, only realizing he'd almost left it behind when he got a particularly lucky glance at it as he was closing the hatch again.

He rolled his sleeves up towards his elbows on his way down the stairs, bag slung over one shoulder. When he reached the side door and pulled it open, he called towards the patisserie: "Headed out, Dad! I'll see you later!"  
"Adrien, wait! I have something for you!"  
He took two paces back, having already been halfway out the door, and pulled it closed before poking his head into the patisserie. "Yeah?"

The large man's back was pointed to him, shuddering in a silent and hard-to-contain laugh, as though he was struggling to stifle the joy of an in-joke. He trembled in place for a couple of seconds before he turned about, loudly and proudly singing a string of non-lexical vocables that sounded suspiciously not unlike a particular anthem. His own 'dun'-based rendition of _la Marseillaise_ concluded with the presentation of a box of assorted macarons and a ceremonious "ta-da! For your class."

Adrien's eyes lit up at the box of macarons.  
He hadn't had macarons in a long time, now that he actually thought about it. When his mother was around, they were still a rare thing that only came about once every few months; now, just shy of two years later, he had almost managed to forget good ones once existed. His dad never seemed particularly keen on macarons in particular - at least not making them - until, apparently, just recently.  
While he was a little less enchanted by the fact he couldn't personally inhale them all, he enthusiastically accepted the box.  
"They look delicious, dad. Thanks." He pulled his eyes off of the macarons as he closed the box. "Everyone's gonna love them," he added as he brought his eyes back up to Tom's face, a grin already secured on his mouth.  
Tom's expression was as eager as it was sentimental, eyes subtly wet - a look that made Adrien's insides squirm, made his throat warm and scratchy, while his mind went jumbled and nervous. It made his grin slip.  
The thought suddenly arrived in his head that his dad, once a superhero in the eyes of his child, safe from all danger, looked deceptively human, soft, and far from impervious to pain. A familiar thought that had taken a while to really wrap his mind around, especially immediately following Emilie's funeral. His mom. Who loved making macarons but didn't really like eating them.  
Shoving the strange, kind of chilling thought once again from his mind, he put the box on the counter and gave Tom as tight a hug as he could. It wasn't much, since his arms hardly went around his dad's total circumference, and his hug seemed quickly out-done when the older Dupain nearly snapped Adrien in half with a two-armed hug in kind.  
"So," he started while he pulled back and gathered the box up again, "Since these are for my classmates, am I gonna get any macarons later?"

"Maybe, after dinner." Tom regained his triumphant posture, "If you get to school on time and your mech can defeat mine."  
"You're going down, and victory will be sweet," Adrien retorted on his way out the patisserie front door. The familiar bell jingled a good-bye at his departure.

One arm cradled the box of macarons while he headed for school, the other securing the strap of his messenger bag while he quickly took four long steps to cross the cross-walk before the pedestrian traffic light turned; the rest of the walk to school, for the most part, would remain purely walking.  
He had this path down-pat, and his path ensured he was never late - it was the same route at the same approximate speed to reach every cross-walk without the need to even stop once.

Adrien's life had a bit more routine than was probably normal; the small variables like how quickly he willed himself out of bed never produced a blemish on his record. He avoided conflict, he'd never been late, and he never planned on changing that.  
Not when his family was intact, not in the dragging, tentative months that followed his mother's disappearance, not in the slow, grieving years that followed the funeral when the world guessed she had passed.  
If anything, those years had him taking special care to remain neutral, treating any delinquint behavior with a wide berth, just like he never stepped up at an opportunity to do good if it could come with backlash - a decision he'd sworn to the second he realized his dad wasn't a marshmallow superhero, he was just a man.

The exception occurred when Adrien was halfway across another street. A man he had just passed crumpled, tumbled, the sound of his cane smacking the pavement sharp against the murmur of the world around him.  
He could have been the only one in the road with him at the time, or no one else had noticed, but Adrien Dupain was the one who rushed to the man's side when the pedestrian light changed.

"What happened? Are you okay?" While panic had set in - he hadn't seen something like that _happen_ before, someone just _falling_ , and everyone on the sidewalks resumed as though nothing was happening still - the adrenaline didn't hit quick enough to make it apparent in his voice.  
The man's eyes zeroed on him immediately, with an inexplicable sort of contentedness, as though he were satisfied or saw something utterly miraculous between himself and Adrien.  
Weird guy.

Incapable of processing the man's expression, Adrien turned his attention instead towards the man's cane, reaching for it and returning it to the man's hands, setting the box of macarons down on the asphalt in the process.  
While he did, the man answered with a phrase he couldn't understand - a different language. An Asian language, for sure, which made sense, given that the old man was Asian.  
It wasn't Japanese, which Adrien was at least a little familiar with, considering his ample exposure to Japanese animation and video games. But... He couldn't place it, and he didn't have the time to list every language he knew before the man continued speaking.  
"Thank you, young man. I am alright."

Adrien nodded and helped the man back to his feet before reaching down again to reclaim the box of macarons set carefully on the ground. An impatient honk interrupted as Adrien went to respond, reminding him that they were right in front of waiting cars.  
"Oh - here."  
He offered his arm to the hunched over man and escorted him out of traffic and harm's way, a small flustered smile and wave being offered to each driver on their way to the sidewalk - the same side of the street Adrien had just left, setting him back and making him wait for the light to change again. This light always felt impossibly long, almost ensuring he would be late to school.  
He considered crossing before the light changed back, as long as traffic was clear enough, but a quick glance both ways assured him that there was a cop car not far off. For a moment, he narrowed his gaze to see if he could at least make out the policeman's features. It could be okay, if it wasn't Officer Roger.

"What is in there?"  
The voice took his attention again, and Adrien looked back to the man he'd escorted across the street. Part of him had expected the man would be gone, if only a few feet away by now, but the man was still posted at Adrien's side, curiously observing the box under Adrien's arm.

"Oh - my dad owns a patisserie. This is his first shot at macarons, I think. I was bringing them to school to share with my classmates." Adrien used his free hand to pull the lid of the box open, showcasing the macarons. Now that he was looking at them again, he realized there were quite a few - more than he needed to ensure everyone in a standard size class got one. It wouldn't hurt if he ate one himself, would it?  
He plucked one out, looked it over, and then offered it to the man next to him. "Would you like one?"  
Graciously, the man accepted, and compliments on the taste came as quickly as the macaron disappeared. Now Adrien couldn't _not_ eat one, and followed suit.  
"It's been some time since I had a macaron this good," the man continued, and Adrien agreed entirely, however wordlessly, while he closed the box again.  
"I'll let my dad know. They probably won't be available today, but there may be some at the Tom Dupain patisserie tomorrow." He gestured back in that direction.  
A grin greeted him. "I will have to visit."

The conversation seemed to die there. While Adrien didn't know what to do about the quiet, the man next to him had descended comfortably into it. Now conscious of the man's presence, Adrien found himself reminded, once again, that the man was on the side of the street that he had intended to be on. Was he just on a walk, seeking company?  
When the pedestrian light changed, they both began across the street.  
It took Adrien a moment before he offered his hand again to the older man, who accepted it with another quiet word of thanks.  
After reaching the next curb, their arms separated, but Adrien remained ever-conscious of the man trailing along with him. Only a block or two remained before he reached the school, so if they were going to talk, now was the time. He thought about what to say.

"So, I was wondering- what was the language you were speaking in just before, _Monsieur_...?" He turned his head towards the man,  
Only to find that he had vanished.  
He wasn't anywhere on the street, back in the crosswalk, or on the sidewalk with him or the other pedestrians that had crossed with them, outside of their little bubble.

A distant bell resonated through the air, and Adrien was once again at attention.  
He hoped that wasn't the tardy bell.

* * *

Adrien made it to the school just after Mme. Bustier had begun re-arranging students through the class.  
He was unfortunately and definitely late, and while he expected a look of mild disapproval when she glanced his way, she instead smiled familiarly. He returned the expression before heading for his usual seat. It was the same seat he'd taken the previous year, and the year before that: second row, second closest to the door. He doubted Mme. Bustier had any plans to move him this year, from how she moved right past him in her reappointing.  
Mme. Bustier directed a student in the back of the class to the front - Nino Lahiffe, who had tried to sit in the back of the class for years now - and seemed satisfied with the changes while everyone swapped seats. It didn't take long for people to familiarize themselves with the people they were sitting with, as most of them had been in the same classes at least a couple of times as they grew up - the primary exception being a brunette girl across the aisle, where the seats closest to the window met with the seats closest to the front, totally immersed in her phone. Adrien had grown up with Nino, who ended up sitting in the seat closest to the door, on the exact opposite side of the girl.  
The brand of familiarity in the class was one of general cohesion and minimal excessive attachment. Some people gravitated towards each other, but most weren't so totally inseparable that they couldn't be across the room from the other, and that included the two boys up front.

Since neither had someone to talk with while the rest of the class buzzed with chatter, Adrien perched forward and nudged Nino, who answered him with a little bump of his fist and a, "Hey, dude, what's up?"

Another student entered late, at the same time that Mme. Bustier stepped into the hall to ensure they weren't expecting anyone else and to usher off other students to their classes. Adrien, consumed with proffering a single macaron Nino's way and talking about his (admittedly uneventful) summer, didn't notice who it was until he found himself in the imposing company of Chloé Bourgeois, who stood just next to his desk, clicking her tongue in annoyance.  
The familiar, condescending posture she assumed was something Adrien had only gotten used to over the latter half of the previous year - but even when he wasn't on the receiving end of that action, he always knew it was only a matter of time.

"Morning, Chloé," he greeted, regardless, an attempt at smiling already on his face. He could get through the day fine if he got to the bottom of her problem and made it seem like she wasn't being particularly unreasonable, he knew. He had this whole method practiced to perfection, but it all started with figuring out what the issue was in the first place.  
Since Nino already had his macaron, the two stopped leaning towards each other over the table that formed Adrien's desk, instead turning their attention towards the blonde girl.  
"Don't settle in, Adrien. That's _my_ seat this year."

His smile faltered for just a second into something a little more inquisitive, but before he could say or ask anything, she leaned over the desk and began pushing her way in. He almost forgot his bag entirely as he withdrew into the row. He managed to ask, regardless. "What's wrong with the other seats?"

Chloé scoffed - as though he had asked an inane question, and for a moment, he almost thought he might've.  
" _Marinette_ is coming to school this year, nothing-for-brains, or didn't you hear?"  
Adrien had no idea what she was talking about, and just shook his head slightly, brows upturned and a still tentative smile on his face. "And she needs this seat?" He didn't care a great deal, but he would be lying if he wasn't a little confused and curious about what was so important about moving him - was it just another form of payback for the previous year?  
"No, she doesn't need _this_ seat. This one is mine. She's bright and attentive, so she's going to be up front, but she's not going to be _right_ at the front because she's not an over-eager _loser_. Right next to the door, so she can come and go easily. Which makes this seat," she indicated the seat Adrien had shifted into, " _her_ seat."  
Adrien looked from Chloé to Sabrina, who had been confidently supporting the argument until it seemed she, too, did the math, and realized she wasn't to be sitting with her companion. A nervous noise that sounded a little like Chloé's name came from the red-haired girl, and the mayor's daughter groaned. "Sabrina, you can sit with headphones in the front. Or behind us, I don't care."

Sabrina, still standing in the aisle, faltered with an unsure expression before re-assuming confidence and cooperatively nodding, swiftly taking the seat behind Chloé. Alix, who had been sitting there boredly absorbing the event before her, immediately rose to find another spot.  
Smart.  
Chloé returned her attention to Adrien, still sitting next to her. "Well? _Move_."  
Adrien raised his hands in momentary surrender, already prepared to surrender his chair - it seemed Chloé wasn't budging. Nino leaned in from just in front of him, chin propped on the desk separating the two, his eyes on Chloé. "Who is Marinette?"

Adrien almost flinched when she started laughing. A few seconds in, Sabrina began laughing equally uproarously, in support of her friend.  
"Only my absolute bestie, ma meuilleure amie, and _the_ most popular, most celebrated model right now?" No recognition crossed either boy's face, still, and she rolled her eyes before sitting in her seat properly. "So get lost, she'll be here any minute!"

When he realized the entire class had grown silent and was watching the two of them, Adrien began to comply, already tired of today - but it would resolve the issue and get Chloé out of his hair. Hopefully that's all she'd want. He stopped before he was fully out of the seat when he heard a ceremonious slap of skin on the desktop. The new girl had moved to her feet, climbed the stairs, and was leaning across Chloé's desk, entering her space.  
"And where do you get off telling anyone what to do?" she asked the girl that looked to her in disgust.  
"Oh, look, Sabrina," Chloé deflected, turning her gaze over to the aforementioned red-head, who immediately began energetically giggling. Chloé's blue eyes focused on Alya's brown ones. "We've got a vigilante in our class this year. Mimicking those superheroes you were blathering on about earlier? What're you going to do, Super _Geek_? Shoot laser beams at me through your glasses?"  
Alya's expression went from annoyed but composed, immediately to boiling in frustration. "Don't tempt me."

When Mme. Bustier re-entered the classroom, her eyes were still aimed out the door, gazing for the school entrance. She seemed to be able to tell that people were still up and standing, though, as she still directed them all to go to their seats without so much as a glance.  
Adrien wondered for a full second what she was really staring out at before Alya was irritably pulling him by the wrist directly over Chloé, momentarily pushing her from the seat in the process. She brought him down the short stairs to the front row and took her seat resolutely. Adrien allowed himself to sit down next to her, while still a little disoriented. A glance to Nino yielded little but a similarly bewildered wideness to his eyes - along with a shrug that shifted Nino's large over-ear headphones - before he looked toward Alya again.  
"Relax, who really cares about seats except her anyway?" Alya asked, once more regaining her cool.  
Adrien became momentarily conscientious about how pitiful his smile had become, but didn't change it. "You've got a pretty confident way of handling Chloé already, new girl."  
"Just following in Majestia's footsteps," she answered, presenting her phone, swiping and tapping her screen a couple of times before a superhero occupied the entire screen. "As she says - 'all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing.'"  
Compelling argument. When Adrien accepted her phone to investigate the superhero, Alya simply sat patiently, then leaned in towards him with a large smile across her lips.  
"I see I rescued a fellow super fan, and I've decided to take particular pride in that. Alya Césaire, future reporter, fighter for the people." A thumb went to her chest.  
Maybe he was a little too obviously receptive - he didn't know well enough yet if she would enthusiastically embrace the other things that fell under his nerd scope, but he wasn't about to snub an opportunity to make a friend. Especially not someone with whom he had at least one interest in common and had enough charisma in her pinky for the two of them.  
"Adrien Dupain." He poised his hand towards her, and she snickered as she took it, providing a firm shake.  
The duo cracked open the box of macarons again and quickly put a sizable dent in the supply, in spite of only managing to pass out a few to the students lining the rows behind them.

Time passed quickly with a friend who he could actually become eager about talking with; for the most part, the classes today seemed to introduce the schedule and had a lot of free time for talking. When he next noticed the time, it had been an hour since the scuffle with Chloé, and he only realized it from Alya passing a knowing look in the mayor's daughter's direction, with a little possibly-too-hard-to-see glance to the empty desk next to her. Chloé became gradually more visibly distressed, occasionally looking even a little embarrassed, which only got exacerbated every time Alya's expression went from enthusiastic over superheroes and new friendships to coy over Chloé's solitude in that desk she'd argued for.  
He didn't like Chloé, not by a long shot. But he did kind of feel bad, only to feel a little more reassured over Alya's various comments following the line of "She made such a big deal out of that seat, and for what?"

At class dismissal, while Mme. Bustier began giving directions to the students based on their class itineraries, Adrien and Alya were joined at their desk. The two moved down the row just enough to make room for Nino to slide into the seat - not a viable option during class, considering the limited table space, but comfortable enough while they were sitting and talking through the passing period.  
"That was intense, Adrien," Nino elbowed Adrien in the side. While the two hadn't done anything over the summer and hadn't talked a great deal since being split into separate classes the previous year, Adrien knew full and well that elbow was as much a cue to give Nino a little extra space as it was asking to have another macaron. Adrien moved to grab the box from his bag again. "What'd you even do to get Chloé to hate you that much? Wasn't she all over you two years ago?"  
Alya leaned forward over the desk, cradling her cheek in one hand, and answered before Adrien had time to make an uncomfortable silence over his reluctance to answer. "She strikes me as the kind of person to hate literally everyone who's in the way. Maybe she'll revert tomorrow."  
"Dunno," Nino answered, shrugging, eyes still focused on Adrien until the box returned to view - at that point, it became the entire visual world, and their conversation continued like background noise. "I never saw her like _that_ ," he shoved a macaron into his mouth, "She had a _ton_ of pet names for him, too."  
The noise Alya made was nothing short of disgust - Adrien couldn't tell if it was from Nino talking through noisy mastication or from the idea of Chloé clamoring over him for attention. When he noticed Alya wasn't going to speak, and was instead looking at him with an eyebrow inclined in skepticism and curiosity, he realized he'd have to answer - truthfully, too, because it seemed hard to talk his way out of the hole he ended up in. He wasn't usually one to start discussions like that, though; he pondered, momentarily, on just saying he didn't have the smallest clue, and leaving it at that.

"Kim!  
The three of them jerked around in their seats to look back over the class to the source of the low, angry shout and threatening stomp that crossed the aisle dividing the room. Ivan - a student that was as wide as he was freakishly tall - had taken a fistful of an athletic student's jacket, pulling him from his seat. Ivan's other hand was reeled back in a fist. Adrien quickly deduced that the shorter of the two was Kim - a face he'd seen in the halls, but never interacted with, never had a class with.  
"Ivan! What is going on?" Mme. Bustier demanded, and when the giant student could produce no words, no explanation, no excuse - only tightening his fists, pulling more of Kim's jacket into his grip and further crumpling a piece of paper mercilessly crushed in his other hand - she simply took in the situation and pointed to the door. "To the principal's office."  
When he looked towards her, brows knit, jaw set, mouth open as if to protest, the comparatively harmless-looking woman tacked on an authoritative, "Now!" that silenced him.

While he released Kim with a grimace, not even Mme. Bustier's disapproval could keep Ivan from slamming his hands on the desk while he grabbed his bag and threw it over his shoulder, or from kicking the door on his way into the hall.

Mme. Bustier stepped out into the hall after him, and the resulting hushed argument in the hallway led Adrien to suspect that either Ivan wasn't headed toward the principal's office at the time, or Mme. Bustier had decided to correct his departing behavior too - leaving the stragglers in the class, including but not limited to the front-of-the-class trio and one disheveled but vaguely smug Kim.  
"Tension runs high," Alya murmured, looking beyond the other two at the desk towards Ivan and Mme. Bustier. "Is that how every day here is? One fight per hour?"  
"No, not usually? Chloé does start a lot of arguments, and I don't really know much about Kim, but things don't usually escalate this much. I think everyone gets along pretty well?" Adrien looked to Nino for verification.  
"Kim and Chloé are kinda the two demons here. Kim less than Chloé, though, definitely. He challenges and taunts people, but that's about it."  
Speaking of, while Kim seemed pleased with himself, he had given Ivan a good head-start before he, too, headed out of the classroom. Nino's eyes trailed over the clock, and he moved to grab his bag. "Whatever we were talking about is probably gonna have to wait, though, guys. I gotta get going for gym."  
"Not me," Adrien moved out from the desk after Nino. "Alya?"  
Alya offered a sympathetic smile to Adrien. "Looks like you're on your own for an hour." Thoughtfully, she pulled out her phone again. "How about you guys give me your numbers? We can still text if we end up split up again."

Alya made the number exchange mutual by sending both of her new contacts quick text. In Nino's, she asked, "What was your name again?" to which he answered with a half-laughed, "Nino Lahiffe." In Adrien's, she said, "We're not done talking about the devil wearing prada and you." to which Adrien simply looked a little startled.  
Not only had Adrien forgotten, he'd kind of hoped the other two had. Or at least that they weren't as interested as it turned out Alya was.

"We should probably get going, though, Alya. The rest of the gym class might already be gone."  
She confirmed they both had her number and she had theirs, and promptly gathered her bag. "Alright, Lahiffe, let's go. Later, Adrien."  
They headed out the classroom together - passing by an ongoing lecture from Mme. Bustier to Ivan that seemed a little less heated than it was before - but Adrien splintered off of their path when the other two headed for the entrance and down the stairs. Alya glanced back, saluted him, and carried on, seeming to start up a conversation with Nino, just out of earshot.

Adrien lingered by the entry, considering following after them. He didn't really need to be in the library to study; he could do it just as well in the bleachers at the stadium or at home. He paced forward, only stopping as he remembered the box of macarons, half-empty, likely still sitting in the classroom.  
... He'd see Alya and Nino later, anyway.  
He headed back to the already-vacant classroom and grabbed the box before heading for the library to offer them to the other students that gathered there, only to find that students perusing books or sitting around the tables were few and far between. Rather than studying or gathering at tables to read, write, draw, or talk quietly, they had gathered in a secluded corner, some kids coming and going at the outskirts of the cluster of kids tucked behind one bookshelf. All of the life in the library seemed concentrated there, still being hushed from excited clamors down to similar-spirited whispers that were too loud to be nondisruptive, but quieter than it would be if everyone sincerely tried to talk over one another. Maybe that was good enough for the librarian.  
Curiously, he wandered over; two kids wandering away from the crowd were murmuring about the competition, and Adrien's first thought went to Kim. He was the guy who supposedly challenged everyone to everything under the sun as long as there was something about it that was close enough to something he was good at, but he'd never seen anyone _this_ invested in his challenges. Usually, he only knew about Kim through the comments about who had emerged victorious - usually, it was him or Alix.  
He slipped between some of the less interested spectators to get a better view, the murmurs of conversation getting softer and softer compared to the noises from the competition at the gridlocked table ahead, where two students were playing _Ultimate Mech Strike III_. One of which was Alix, but there was the noticable absence of Kim.  
It made sense why so much of the library-appointed student body had coalesced in this side of the library - the game had so much hype around it that there was already discussion of a movie in the UMS universe being drafted, and that fact remained a similarly hot topic, usually mentioned within the same breath as acknowledging that the movie would definitely be terrible, given that there was next to no lore or plot in the game itself.  
It was known well enough that Adrien's dad spent the bulk of his downtime playing and training his son in the ways of robot battles. Robottles, if you will. Nevermind, that was terrible.

He leaned in a bit, finally edging his way more towards the front of the crowd so he could lean in towards Alix. "When did we get UMS in study hall?"  
Alix flicked a mildly irritated glance over to Adrien, and it occurred to him that maybe he wasn't the first person to bother Alix while she was playing. He tried to give her his most apologetic smile. She answered with a tone that matched her face, "There's going to be a big competition in a couple of months, with a lot of schools participating. Our school entered, and any student that has high enough grades and wins the mini-tournament here can be one of the champions."  
"So these are the try-outs? Already?"  


"No, Adrien, they're practice," she answered, aggression rising, "in case any students can't afford the console at home but want to participate in the future, or if people just don't have time at home. Someone donated it, or, brought it in, or something? I don't know! I'm busy, get out of my face."  
He withdrew, sheepishly. Tension really did run high today. Carefully, he deployed a single macaron in front of her on the table - it distracted her again, but Alix looked a little apologetic, herself, and just gave him a vaguely bothered smile before returning to the game. Hatchet buried.

"You brought macarons?" Adrien's attention was pulled over to the questioning party - a short, spectacled boy with a slanted flat top. He vaguely recognized him from his class this year, but like Kim, he wasn't in any of the classes preceding it.  
"Yeah," he answered, attempting to place a name of an unknown face to the new face, and came up empty. Instead, he offered the box.  
The shorter boy took only one and looked it over. "My name is Max Kanté, by the way. I already know you're Adrien." Max kept the macaron in-hand, still. "Not that we really know each other or have ever been in the same class before this year. I learned of you through one of my closer associates, Lê Chiến Kim, and his less reputable companions. Although, this morning certainly helped me to recognize you."  
"Oh. Yeah, that was... I'm sorry about that."  
"It doesn't bother me in the slightest. In fact, this kind of outcome was something I might've easily predicted after last year's events. Even before that, in all actuality." It took an entire second before Max segued on to the next conversation piece, before Adrien caught up with his vague words. "Anyway, were you going to try and join the competition?"  
"I, uh, haven't really thought about it. Maybe, though." He did enjoy the game, and he did play it well, but whether or not he was ready to enter a tournament remained a question.

"There is a running queue of who will be participating in practice today. We can add your name to the queue, but from the current line-up, I don't expect that you will be able to play through this break. So far, the layout of the practice has been a mini-tournament of sorts, where the victor of each round can play against the next players in the queue, up to five consecutive rounds. After five rounds of victory, their name is set aside in the roster of prospective champions, and they're obligated to pass along the privilege of playing to the next person in the queue. There is also a social board," Max gestured to a forgotten clipboard on a nearby shelf, already covered in pen-marks, which Adrien could only assume were names and numbers, "so people can discuss visiting one another after school for practice, as well as who has a console and the game or is expecting to acquire them within the immediate future. So there are still opportunities."  
"Oh, cool. It sounds like a lot of work went into this," Adrien commented, a little bit astounded.  
"A trifle," Max claimed, but he sounded proud. "All of this only took a couple of days to accomplish, and was a necessary cornerstone to having the school enter the competition to begin with. Bringing my console and the game to use during school hours and setting up reasonable accommodations for other prospective champions were my more _effective_ bargaining chips. The real work will begin with actual practice and preparation for the tournament to come."  
"Wait, _you_ did all this? Not some school committee or club?"  
The smug smile on Max's face remained intact, and, for effect, he crossed his arms behind his back while straightening his spine from his mildly meek posture and raising his chin.  
"Max, that's awesome! I guess you're probably already at the top of the leaderboard, huh?"  
The question immediately interrupted Max's proud stature, and his expression yielded into something sheepish. "I - well, in truth, I haven't actually played the game myself just yet. My time since its release and the challenge has been spent in making the framework to make winning the gold possible." When Adrien's face of awe had turned stale and leaned towards skepticism, he quickly added, "However! I do have _far_ more motivation to practice than most, and practice I will until I emerge atop the other contenders. In the case I should fail, I'll have to give up at least one night of D &D per week, minimum, to join Kim at the gym. Winning this tournament and taking home the trophy seemed considerably more viable than attempting to out-run our school's top athlete."  
"Out-run?"  
"Yes. Kim has challenged me to acquire a medal, since I haven't exactly accrued a great deal of them in my lifetime... And this seemed as good an opportunity as any. Failure, however, is not much of an option."  
"Oh, it's one of _those_ challenges."  
"Indeed. Fortunately, though, my direct involvement in this event has forbidden Kim from participating, meaning he will be around primarily as moral support and a reminder of the consequence of underperforming."  
Adrien chuckled a little, a bit confused, but couldn't question it before the room erupted in alarm at Alix's fourth consecutive victory, earning the coalescence of students a loud "Quiet!" that seemed to come from nowhere. In the aftermath, they fell into silence that returned to gradually rising whispers - a phenomenon that Adrien hadn't noticed when he first joined the crowd or any moment until the big outburst.

When Max tapped the box in Adrien's hands, he was reminded once more of the macarons, and offered the box again to Max.

"Not for me," Max clarified, and he pushed his glasses up. "Were you intending to distribute them among the other participants?"  
"Oh - yeah." With a small wave to Max, Adrien slipped through the crowd to distribute the remaining macarons, quieting a lot of the whispers instead for satisfied-sounding hums and muffled words of gratitude. He catalogued each one in his mind as another reason why Tom should make them more often. When the box was empty, Adrien had made it once more to the edge of the gathering, and decided to take his leave. He could forward the news of how well-received the macarons were to his father with what time remained of the break.

Sabrina and Chloé were just within the library doors, and while there was some sense of urgency in keeping quiet, Chloé's voice amounted more like shouts.

"How didn't you hear it, idiot! That _thing_ practically broke the sound barrier!"  
"I still don't... really know what that 'thing,' is, Chloé..."  
"The big - it's - God, Sabrina! I can't believe I have to explain it all over again! It was Ivan, and then it wasn't. It was like, a big huge pile of rocks, and it shouted so loud I thought I would go deaf from down the hall."  
"I didn't hear it, maybe... It's because the library is so sound-proof?" she offered, still hesitantly and meekly.  
Chloé didn't respond to Sabrina - instead, she was turning her attention to Adrien, slinking past them. "Um, _excuse me_ , nothing-for-brains, where are you going?"  
Adrien halted, looked at them, and lifted the box, as if it provided an answer on its own. "... I've gotta run home real quick?"  
"Word from the wise, no you don't. There's a big monster on the loose."  
He couldn't help but almost laugh. "What??"

Incredulous, Chloé immediately crossed her arms. "You know what, nevermind. Go out there, get eaten or something, see if _I_ care."  
Adrien offered a small nod before heading past them. In spite of herself, Chloé continued to call after him that it was dangerous, that she wouldn't be held accountable if something happened to him. He let himself chuckle a bit more when it seemed she was far enough out of earshot that she wouldn't hear. He knew she had a tendency to be dramatic virtually always - but this was new.

As he exited the library, his phone began to ring. Rather than texting, it looked like Alya had found an opportunity to call.  
He answered, "How are you pulling off using your phone in class? You really are something," his voice full of laughter already.  
Alya sounded comparatively excited as well as breathless. "Class was cancelled, Adrien. Something _incredible_ happened," and the phone gave way to breaths, sounding like she was running. "First, don't worry, Nino is safe, we just got separated, and second, there's an actual rock behemoth running around Paris."  
"What?"  
"Like - think of a person, but if that person was four times the size of a normal person, and entirely made out of rocks. Haven't you ever played Everquest?"  
"I... Might have? Which one?"  
"Doesn't matter, the point is, there's a monster, or, if I'm right - it might be a _supervillain_."  
"So you skipped class to get a comic book?

Adrien proceeded down the stairs from the library and out of the school. While his tone had been comical until that point, while Alya spoke, the reality of her words - and of Chloé's words - sunk in. Cars were overturned on sidewalks, one on top of a snapped tree that was a good two feet wide; large craters covered the walkway as well as the roadway. Bags and baubles had been abandoned, leaving the place as empty as it looked desolate.

"No! An actual, real life - listen, okay. It's calling itself 'Stoneheart,' and it's destroying the city. I think it's on its way to the stadium? It came from that way, but based off of how they're trailing it on the news, I think it's on a circuit or something - and headed right back. It's actually following the same route we were headed on to get there, going around the road work." She paused, then muttered a bit, still breathily, "Although, they did say it also passed by the school, I'm not sure what circuit it's taking..." After a second of breathing, her voice picked up again, and she resumed, "Anyway- Anyway - it looks like I might be right about it heading back for the stadium. Are you in, or what?"  
" _In?_ "  
"I'm in the middle of the chase, and it'd be cool if we could both be there with cameras. Besides - where there's a super _villain_ , there's usually a super _hero_ close behind."  
"Hold on, Alya, you're _chasing it_?"  
"Of course I am!"  
"They probably have drones filming it, that's dangerous."  
She sounded more exasperated this time, and her tone carried its finality. "I'm not missing this, and I don't think you want to, either. If you do come, bring your camera so we have a second feed!"

She hung up in that same second, and Adrien breathed in the smell of the ruin around the school. Paris was under attack, and it mostly smelled of burned rubber.  
His instincts told him to go home. This time, he was sprinting.

* * *

The patisserie was locked from all sides, with the Open sign carefully turned over to indicate they were closed. By the time Adrien reached the side door, he realized his hands were shaking from the sheer cacophony of his keys and his struggle to introduce the right one to the lock. The moment the door was open, he slipped through it and pushed it shut again, taking in the pounding of his heart only as it overwhelmed the volume of his loud steps up the stairs into the apartment.  
His father was nowhere to be found, and there was no indication that he expected Adrien would be there, looking for him. To be thorough, Adrien double checked the bakery, still heaving and shouting "Dad," three times, minimum, per room he entered. The ovens were off, meaning he had time to turn everything off and close everything up before disappearing. This was probably for a delivery, or because they were out of something unexpected, but hope remained that Tom remained in the safety of their apartment in a relatively untouched district to Stoneheart, and he ran again up the stairs, this time even investigating his own room, and the rooftop.

Still, no sign of Tom Dupain.  
Adrien spent a full minute composing a simple text, fighting every single typo his still-trembling hands produced, and finally found some use in the auto-corrector.  
_Dad are you ok? Are you at the store? Have you seen the news?_

No response for five, six, seven, eight - and he really should stop counting the seconds, as they only exacerbated his worry. Maybe he'd check the news, himself. Maybe, just maybe, Stoneheart would be steering clear of any area he or his father visited often. Maybe it would be swimming in the Seine. Unable to bring himself to sit, he simply pushed his chair aside and moved to type, knowing the monitor would awaken at the slightest action.  
His keyboard, however, was out of place, and pushed to the side of his desk. Where it was previously lay a small, dark jewelry box with an ornate crest on its upper lid.  
Seeming just as alien as the villain perusing the streets of Paris for a new thing to destroy, all of Adrien's focus fell on this otherwise innocuous-looking box. Part of him filled with a sense of déjà vu, like he had seen this kind of scene before. No, it was like he had even seen this emblem once before.  
He willed both of his hands not to shake as he reached for the box and lifted it. He prepared himself for it to be impossibly heavy, but it rose just as easily as any normal item of its size might. With a careful shake, he could hear that there was definitely something inside. Something... Metal and small. He held it still and carefully lifted the lid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm currently deciding whether to continue the fic with the same day from Marinette's perspective for half of the chapter before reverting mostly to Adrien's again, or if the fic should remain predominantly and almost exclusively Adrien's perspective.
> 
> I'd like to hear your thoughts, so please leave comments below!


	2. Who Let the Cats Me-Out?

He flinched as a black mass erupted from the box; it darted directly upwards, flitting about in a disorienting display of light and dark, thin, tendril appendages whipping about.

A voice came, as aggravated as it was tired, as ornery as it was squeaky. "Geez, didn't anyone tell you to handle fancy parcels with care?"  
The black mass finally settled on Adrien's desk, stretching out and taking a huge breath audibly. "So much for action, I think I'm out of commission..." One small leg flicked out from under its body, and it lay across the cable of Adrien's mouse. "I'm calling it a day... Don't wake me..."

The desolation from the world outside and the disappearance of Adrien's father went quickly forgotten as he observed the palm-sized, vaguely feline bug beyond its pathetically twitching antennae.  
It was like...  
Like a thing out of a cartoon or comic book.  
Like an unnecessary, cheap comedic relief character, representing every unwanted moral failure possible, but had enough compassion to redeem itself in the eyes of children.  
But also, if only because it emerged from a jewelry box, "Like the genie in the lamp...!"

Speaking was enough to rouse the bug from its impromptu nap, as it opened a small, beady green eye with an air of fatigue.  
"No," it argued, like it was correcting an obvious error, its tone not far from complaining "not like the genie in the lamp - one, because I don't just grant three wishes with a million strings attached, and two -"  
It trailed off, failing to stifle a long yawn that exposed tiny but still protruding and sharp teeth. It shuddered as its back arced before sprawling once more.  
"Two, I'm way more personable."

"I don't know," Adrien answered, also mentally noting that he didn't know what was going on in the world at this moment - what was this thing he was talking to? He inspected the bug. "It's not like you're voiced by Robin Williams."  
"Robin who?"  
"... The guy that voiced Genie?"

The cat bug offered a tired, maybe critical eye, before moving past their conversation and casting a glance around the room. "What do you have to eat around here? I'm famished."  
It didn't wait before it began to float across the room - no wings, no clear means of suspension, just _floating_. "Um, well... We're right above a boulangerie-patisserie, so..." Bread? Cake? Quiche?  
Those sharp teeth might've meant meat.

"No, before you go any further, I'll simply let you know that I have an extremely delicate appetite," it interjected, just before it began curiously and almost indiscriminately testing various objects around the room - based on its reactions, it was entirely to figure out whether or not it could even dig its teeth through something.

"So," he started, trying to put the various objects together in his mind. What was the potential appeal of trying to eat an empty brass prong meant for hanging his jackets? The ball-end of an umbrella? "... Only things that aren't actually edible?" He only kicked himself into gear when the creature picked up the pace and began biting into things that actually took damage from his little teeth, and he began snatching at the air when the tuft at the end of a scarf he never wore was bitten off - to no avail, as the bug began darting faster, more evasively, and didn't dignify Adrien with an answer to his question.

Finally, he decided for a bit more of a roundabout approach; he headed up the stairs towards his loft bed, overlooking the rest of the room where the bug came to a slow and humbled itself over one of Adrien's console controllers. Carefully, he jumped across the room, bracing himself to roll across the floor when his hands wrapped around the bug.  
He breathed, furrowed his eyebrows, and focused on the small entity that looked rather unimpressed with the interruption of his taste-test spree.

"So you've tried to eat plastic, metal, yarn, - what else... More importantly, what are you if you can digest that?"

"I'm a kwami," it answered, simplistically. "My name is Plagg, I grant magical powers, yours is the power of destruction, is that all? I'm in the middle of something."  
"The power of destruction," Adrien repeated after Plagg, and it was only in that moment that he realized his room was in total disarray, from his grabbing, Plagg's fleeing and darting. He also noticed the lack of cameras posted around his room, but still asked: "Is this a joke? Am I on T.V.? What's this show called?"

He couldn't tell if this was Plagg's natural state, or the questions became increasingly stultifying, but Plagg sounded fatigued and its eye shape modified with the implication of maneuvering brows - in doubt and annoyance, definitely. "Are you going to let me go or do I have to phase through your hand? I don't really like having to do that, it takes too much energy."

"From how talkative you are, it sounds like you have energy to spare?"

"Wrong. I'm tired, and you ask too many questions."

"Oh. Right, I forgot, I was asking questions."

"No," Plagg groaned, tendril antennae drifting just out of the way for the bug to exasperatedly smush its face against the crest of Adrien's hand.

"Where do I even start?"

Plagg remained with its head defeatedly burrowed into Adrien's hand. In a moment of merciful consideration, Adrien set the kwami down on his desk once again.  
"Promise not to destroy my room?" he proposed, fingers still containing the creature. Unless it really could phase through things at will. In which case, this was ineffective and pointless.  
His curiosity was answered with a 'maybe, but probably not', as the kwami merely answered, "Fine, stop crushing me."

He found his computer chair and wheeled it back to the desk before looking expectantly unto the kwami. He organized his thoughts, reviewed the creature. Everything was so above his paygrade, he couldn't even conjure up the right questions to ask.  
Not without a tone of exasperation, Plagg broke the quiet. "Not that I don't love that you're actually not asking things, but if you're gonna, I kind of want to get this over with?"

"I'm figuring that out. It's not every day I find some weird bug thing in my room, much less one that can talk, even less one that is apparently magical."

"Some weird bug thing," Plagg repeated, and Adrien shrugged. "Again. Kwami. Plagg."

They spent the next fifteen minutes with a back-and-forth that went a mile an hour, hitting every stopping point it could, getting sidetracked and eventually remembering the goal.  
By the end of it, Plagg had explained that while it didn't look like much, it was a boy, and would appreciate being called him, that Adrien had been chosen for the suddenly-silver Black Cat ring because he showed promise as a potential hero - who had chosen him, Plagg wouldn't say -, and was to face off with Stoneheart, along with his partner - who, the kwami speculated, was probably going through a similar Q&A with their kwami, too.

"I have a partner? Shouldn't I probably know who they are if I'm going to work with them?"  
"Oh, believe me, you'll know when you see them. They'll be the only other transformed person in all of Paris that isn't a big rock formation."  
"I don't mean just so I can tell," Adrien slipped the ring on. It had seemed a little large for him at first, but now that it was on his ring finger, it felt like it had been crafted for his hands alone. "So I can trust them, so I know how to work with them because of their powers."  
"Well, no. You shouldn't know who they are, and they shouldn't know who you are. But you'll have to figure out how to work with them on the job. But just so you know, hers will be the power of creation, sort of... To counter the power of destruction."  
"Her?"  
"Maybe? The Ladybug is usually given to someone who is designated female, and the Black Cat is given to someone designated male, and they're supposed to compliment one another."  
"That's kinda cool, and also kind of weird? So there's always one girl and one boy?"  
"No. But in your case, with the Ladybug and the Black Cat, you're supposed to be the inverse and complete each other, as a whole."  
"So we're... Soulmates?" He couldn't tell if he was more amused, excited, or skeptical; all of the tones bled into each other and he may have just come off as surprised.  
"Someone's getting mushy." Maybe he was. "Maybe you are, maybe you aren't, but you're going to be in the same boat, so good luck to you both."  
Adrien almost didn't realize he had begun to sink into a reverie as he thought up a Ladybug companion before he pulled himself out of it. "Wait - you're not coming with me?"

Plagg didn't answer, and Adrien took it he would likely be on his own. Experimentally, Adrien prodded a couple of things around his room with a finger, to see if they would spontaneously fall to nothing or unravel; the scarf stayed intact, his nightstand didn't collapse on itself. "How am I supposed to do this without you, though? I don't even know how _my_ power works yet, much less how it's going to help the Ladybug."  
"You can't use your power right now. You haven't transformed."  
"Transformed?"  
"Yeah. You can only use the Cataclysm after you transform, which you do by saying 'Transform me,' or 'Claws Out.'"  
"So my power is Cataclysm, I can only use it after transforming."  
"Yep."  
"And do I transform into a kwami like you?"  
"No, you'll still be human. You'll just get the powers of the Black Cat Miraculous and clothing to disguise you."  
"Disguise?" Adrien turned on his heels towards the kwami, who tiredly returned his gaze.  
"Remember how I said your partner shouldn't know who you are, and you shouldn't know who your partner is? It's not just that you were chosen because you're strangers, or even that you are strangers. You shouldn't see someone on the street and know they're your partner because it's dangerous."  
"Dangerous? How? We'll both have powers."  
The kwami stretched out his haunches, tone shifting from drowsy to vaguely bothered while he accepted the impossibility of sleeping. "When you're transformed. When you're not, even if you still have the Miraculous and you might adapt because of the Miraculous, it's not like you can destroy stuff just by touching it."  
"Not until I transform."  
"Right. So that's why you have the disguise, so things like Stoneheart don't come after you when you can't transform."  
"Alright," Adrien ceded, reviewing the Miraculous, processing, but still hardly digesting any of Plagg's words. It was all new, and while parts of it weren't unlike some stories he'd read or shows he'd watched, there were tons of little nuances. Still - it wasn't like he was completely going in blind. "Sounds good. I'm ready," he said, much more quietly, to himself, before speaking up. "What were those words before again? Paws out? Or..."  
Recognition flooded the kwami's face, and he urgently began protesting, "I haven't finished, there's other stuff-"  
"Oh, right- Claws out!"

* * *

When the green and white lightshow faded from the room, Adrien took in the sight of his own reflection on the black of his monitor.  
After Plagg had said he would transform, get a disguise and powers, Adrien already had an idea of what he thought he might look like - and while he had hoped with all his might through what he could only have imagined was a transformation sequence in the moment (completely accurately, he might add), he was glad his first thought wasn't exactly what he ended up with.  
The black leather with little accenting seams made him feel more powerful than something tighter and less-visibly-bulletproof like spandex. The mask didn't come with whiskers, but that might have been a little too extra, especially given the cat ears in his slightly-messy hair, inexplicably standing in place, moving while he attempted to wiggle his _normal_ ears.  
While he might be a little biased, he had to say he thought he looked particularly freaking awesome.  
"Plagg, this is so cool," he announced, one hand going to his chin as he tilted his head toward the monitor. "It doesn't even actually look that much like me - I mean, _I_ know who I am, and I can sorta tell, but if I didn't know, I probably wouldn't be able to figure it out."  
Quiet; Adrien imagined Plagg was ignoring him and his enthusiasm, but the blond decidedly required a second opinion. He looked around for the kwami with small glances around his new ensemble, taking in the Miraculous that rest on his finger. It had been silver when he first put it on, but now, it was as black as the rest of his garb, with a light green paw pad featured on its face.  
"Plagg?"  
No response. Well, he'd show up.  
Adrien rushed to get a better look in the bathroom mirror, and decided this couldn't possibly be anything but a dream. While he could see everything in its usual color, the green of his eyes had intensified and bled into the white of his sclera, his pupils looking like dilated slits while he appraised himself. The details of the leather ensemble stuck out better, from the little repeating pattern that reflected the light like scales to the fact every metal accent matched the bell at his collar. Maybe the reason why the leather wasn't _completely_ skin-tight was the unusual and thick softness behind the smooth, comfortable armor. His hands were gloved, his fingertips clawed, and he noticed for the first time that a belt wrapped just above the widest part of his hips, falling behind him in the form of a tail. Turning to see it revealed a silver baton in the mirror reflected at the small of his back. He reached for it while he muttered to himself.

"Awesome. Pawesome. Awesome possum. But not really, that's too much. Hmm," He brought a hand to his chin, getting a little distracted with himself again while one hand idly fiddled with the baton.  
This look was unusual for him; he erred for something that, now that he was leather-clad and masked, he couldn't help but describe as kind of... Purr-e.  
And while he wasn't about to stand in front of the mirror all day offering himself compliments and experimenting with cat puns, he was very much tempted by the unusually easy devilish look his expression could turn into now that his eyebrows weren't showing.

The reason he pulled away before much time had passed was the sound of someone in the boulangerie-patisserie below.  
Tom.  
His dad was home. He was home, he was safe, _but how was Adrien supposed to change back? How was he supposed to explain this?_  
An attempt to pull the suit away was made in vain, and his mask wouldn't come off of his cheekbones. Quickly and quietly, he fled the bathroom and headed for the rooftop. To his relief, Tom didn't seem to notice him, being too distracted by a kind of frenzied phone call.  
When he emerged from the skylight of his room and closed it just over his bed, he remembered Plagg, that he'd gone missing. Surely, if Tom found Plagg, there would be some kind of additional ruckus below - but Adrien hoped he would find Plagg somewhere atop the boulangerie-patisserie. There wasn't much to the rooftop - a table under a large parasol, four chairs around it in spite of only ever having served three people, a couple of pots where herbs once grew until Tom had reassigned them to the kitchen, now empty.  
There was no Plagg, but before he could even think of searching the side of the building, the rest of the rooftop of adjacent buildings, he was reminded of the devastation taking over Paris by a car being hurled across a street - it didn't reach this area just yet, but it was close enough that shouting and screaming and crying seemed to elevate and remind Adrien that there was something more pressing than a missing kwami, the reason why the world demanded he transform.

All forgotten at the time in the wake of the strange parcel in his room, the talking bug, the realization that he looked like a superhero, _was_ a superhero-to-be.  
What Alya wouldn't give to see him now, even if she might be agitated that he'd lost sight of the importance of his duty simply because it was all so surreal.

Crap. Alya.  
She had been pursuing the mountain of rocks, and he hadn't heard back from her since. How was he going to help?  
Plagg had vanished.  
He took in his situation once more. Perhaps he could fly, like Plagg? He went for the rail of his balcony, only decidedly growing anxious of the idea when he reached the edge - if he was wrong, that was a long way down, and he wouldn't be saving Paris like this. Besides, it wasn't exactly normal for cats, black or not, to fly. But he couldn't go downstairs and run the whole way - maybe he could jump. Always land on his feet.  
Or immediately mess up, break a leg, and end up in the hospital while Stoneheart terrorized Paris.  
His hands went over the railing while he tried to get a good look across the city; he knew which direction he'd have to go, but what use was a cat that couldn't get out of its own house? Where was the Ladybug?  
Was the Ladybug already facing Stoneheart?

He fiddled with his baton, thinking, listening intently for Tom downstairs again. It didn't seem like he was leaving - he was glad of the fact, maybe he would stay home, stay safe, but that also meant he wouldn't be able to get out.  
Maybe he would have to scale the wall. That sounded like trouble, but... Better than jumping and hoping. Eventually, though, he'd have to decide.

That moment came sooner than he expected when Tom's voice suddenly came from Adrien's room. He was muffled by the barely cracked open skylight, but Adrien couldn't take the chance anymore. He wrapped the uppermost part of his tail around the baton before securing it in his belt - only realizing at that moment there were designated straps for his baton, but he didn't have time - and swung his legs over the railing, slowly moving his way down and seeking places to rest his feet and fingers. Maybe, just maybe, he could get down a floor or two, and the fall wouldn't be so bad.  
The rattle of the skylight door made Adrien freeze, and his fingers slipped from their places. Desperately, he clawed at the wall to keep from falling, seeking anything and everything.

He expected to plummet and twist his ankle.  
He didn't do that.  
He expected some harsh impact.  
None to speak of.

The claws at the ends of his fingers had sliced through the wall like a soft cheese, but not far enough to let his hands come right back from the building again; marks made themselves known on the exterior wall, giving him two places to grab on.  
He would have been in awe if it wasn't for the sudden fear shaking him when Tom's voice came from above.

"Adrien!"  
Shouting from the roof into the streets. Not looking down at his son who was both horrified and possibly unrecognizable.  
When Tom's back was turned, Adrien quickly dropped a couple meters, latched onto the wall again, and fell the rest of the way to his feet. He could still hear Tom's voice, and he hugged the building with his back, staying out of sight, idly going to fix his baton before deciding instead to inspect it until Tom retired into the bakery or he thought of a new route to get to the stadium.  
Whichever came first.  
Surely it had some use, but aside from being used in relays, he couldn't think of much. He turned it in his hands while Tom's voice carried over the sky again. Another crash a few streets down. Tom's voice raising, and Adrien had to move further down the road, avoiding being seen, so he could try and get some distance.  
The sheer distress in his father's voice made him want to run back in as much as he wanted to run away and get this done with.

When his eyes returned to the baton and Tom's voice carried in the direction opposite, fading easily behind the buildings, he spotted a paw-print on the silver stick; he pushed it with his thumb, and the stick split, one end coming down, the other remaining steadfast in his grip. It revealed a screen, with the same repeated green paw-print on its background, the time - it was a phone.  
While his exasperation grew, so, too, did the boiling chaos on the horizon, as the city shook with an impossibly loud, impossibly _close_ shout, too loud, too gruff to discern meaning.

It was go time, whether or not he had any idea what he'd be doing; he began running towards the shouting.  
What he wouldn't have done for something more useful. Like, maybe a sword?  
Within that moment, the screen closed and the baton suddenly extended into a staff - slamming firmly into the ground and propelling him a couple of feet in the air before he came back down, barely holding onto the silver staff.

... Ok, better? How did that work, though?  
If nothing else, he now had a weapon that wouldn't mean he'd have to claw the rock to death.

But if all he had was a staff, he couldn't imagine what the holder of the Ladybug Miraculous would be bringing to the table.  
Small knives? Blowing darts? ... Toxic flowers?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter.  
> The next one will be from Marinette's perspective and explore the first particularly big effect on the AU. Since it's going to explore Marinette's life a little more, like the first chapter did for Adrien, it will be longer.  
> I have it mostly mapped out, it's just a matter of typing now!


	3. Luck on Her Side

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A new year comes with new promise for Marinette, and luck is on her side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Marinette Agreste-Cheng has artwork! This is her. https://appropriateamountofonions.tumblr.com/post/172402981749/marinette-agreste-cheng-for-the-au-altho-i-guess

Marinette was playing a dangerous game.  
She vaulted over a park bench as she darted through the Place des Vosges at a peculiar angle - specifically, the shortest possible route from entering the planned square to exiting it, shaving a few seconds off of her ETA.  
Crucial seconds that might mean she got up the Collège Françoise Dupont stairs before any assistant-toting cars could head her off.

It had been a full year and a handful of months since she'd last seen Chloé in the flesh. While the vice grip Marinette's father had on her schedule and leaving permissions were always stringent, restrictions became tighter, limits became more pronounced all too suddenly.  
Where Chloé was once free to come and go from the Agreste manor as she pleased while Marinette was there and it didn't conflict with anything else in her schedule, something not entirely unlike a ban had been enacted from all unauthorized personnel entering the premises.  
They could talk online and through texts, certainly, but visiting, speaking, was a thing of the past.  
This year, however, Chloé had pulled a few strings to secure a place for Marinette at her school, all right under her father's nose, yet somehow, completely undetected.  
If she only made it to class, she would be free for a few hours.

She had somewhere to escape to as soon as she could get out of her house.

Today, she decided, was a good day.  
Luck, she decided, was on her side.  
The fact she stumbled and managed to continue speeding across the Place des Vosges instead of tumbling, spraining her ankle, and getting a mouthful of well-trodden sallow dirt was proof of that. The fact she made it through the square, heedless of the beautiful trees and the joy of playing children in the backdrop of her currently frenzied world, without running directly into someone or being spotted, was proof of that.  
The school was almost in sight, she knew; she'd looked it up numerous times and was now traveling by memory.  
She was almost there.  
_She was almost there._

She was almost stepping into the street when a car passed, and she realized the light wasn't in her favor. She remembered cars that didn't carry Nathalie or Gabriel or the materials for her father's work or mail existed, and she stopped just in time - while stopping so suddenly almost sent her into the road regardless, she didn't fall into the passing car, she managed to tumble backwards, and she felt all the more assured that luck was on her side today.

Marinette looked both ways down the street, doubting she'd make it between the next waves of cars, but she itched with anticipation, watching the world around her with wide, anxious eyes.  
For anyone who might be looking at her a little too much, too ready to recognize her from the various ads posted around the city.  
For traffic to clear enough she could continue running to school.  
For the light to change so she could do so without watching for traffic.  
For specific cars and specific faces on the passengers in said cars.  
For elderly Chinese men that began shuffling across the crosswalk before it was anywhere _near_ safe.

Her heart thudding in her ears no longer defined every moment that passed where she might be noticed, might be caught, might be stopped - instead, it began painstakingly counting every step the man took into the street, no, every slight shift of his muscles leading to a new step or ending the one before.  
" _Monsieur-_ " Her voice caught in her throat over her slight breathlessness as her lungs struggled to catch up from all of her running, all of the adrenaline, all of the sudden _fear_. Other people's eyes turned upward and gasps echoed, but no bodies moved.  
The man's gaze stayed on the asphalt before him; one hand was poised behind his back, the other clutching his cane with withered, wisened fingers.  
She glanced around, quickly, ignoring the feeling of a few long strands of hair slapping her cheeks and poking her eyes.  
Luck was on her side, she decided, as she charged forward.

Her strides were as long as they were fast, albeit impossibly heavy. Heaviness that made her wonder if she'd reach him before cars reached the both of them.  
She was halfway across the street when she heard tires squealing while drivers slammed on their brakes, when someone honked.  
She all but plucked the man off of the road and out of the way while disgruntled and terrified drivers rapidly changed speeds and narrowly avoided colliding with one another, much less the jaywalking pedestrians.  
Her foot smacked into his cane, sending it flying to the feet of the people on the side of the street he was on previously.  
She fell over the curb into safety with the man in tow.

Someone was cursing through a rolled-down window, cars were honking, and there were sounds of vague concern and celebration from bystanders, and when Marinette got to her feet again, she was apologizing profusely; none of it registered in her head fully, and it was all dulled by the sound of her heart thudding vigorously in her head.  
When her apologies stopped, traffic resumed, and the man was back to his feet with the help with a few bystanders, Marinette finally had time to acknowledge the man next to her.  
Her eyes stung, her brows were knit together, her voice was rough in her throat, her distress clear on her face as well as her tone.  
"What were you _thinking_!?" was the first thing out of her mouth.  
The sheer sound of her voice had people backing up a few paces, giving the two some space, their well-meaning contributions ebbing.  
By the look on his face, the old man was also taken off-guard and renderred mostly speechless.

She hesitated, realization crossing her features, and she covered her mouth for a moment with trembling fingers. Rather than sitting quietly and staring at him, ruminating in her error, she knelt to retrieve his forgotten cane from the edge of the street. She kept one hand up towards him in case he required her support to stand, now that everyone else gave them at least a few inches of berth.  
He didn't make contact, so either he was okay standing without a cane, or at least okay enough that he could decide against touching the hand of the girl who had just shouted in his face. Guilt swarmed her stomach, not unlike a thousand angry butterflies.  
She kept her eyes on the ground, her tone even, while she stood upright again and returned the cane to his hands.

"My apologies, _Monsieur_ , that was very rude of me. I only meant, that was unsafe, and you could have been hurt."  
Her voice came out more robotically than she would have liked - it only exacerbated the elevating guilt filling her gut, and she thought for an entire second that she might be sick. Not here, in front of a thicket of ten people, on the shoes of an old man, but maybe when she got away from them. Tentatively, she pushed on. "A-are... You alright, _Monsieur_?"

A cryptic smile had bloomed on his face. " _Xièxie_ ," he murmured, almost as though he hardly really wanted her to hear.  
Recognition bloomed over her face, but he continued quickly. "I am fine. You are very kind, _Madamoiselle_...?"

"Agrestinette Marie-Chen. I mean... M... Marinette Agreste-Cheng."  
She swallowed, blinked, processed. If he was Chinese, her behavior could be even more deplorable than she already realized. She forced more words out, and they came out just as fumbled as the ones before. " _Shǒ wǒ- Shì bǒ bú- Shì wǒ bú d-_ "  
"You do not need to apologize," the man perceptively interrupted, cutting her short, and catching her words in the back of her mouth. Words that may have been the right ones. "You did save me."  
She breathed out all too audibly, anxiously bringing her hands together over her stomach. "I also... Treated you disrespectfully."  
He smiled kindly to her, patting her hands. "It was very dangerous for me to wander into the street without looking or thinking. I will be more careful." His tone shifted into one of knowing. "Thank you, Marinette Agreste-Cheng."

In spite of having little charm to it and his strange words, the man's smile felt contagious. The same curve crawled over Marinette's lips, with extreme appreciation in turn. She took a full moment in that sensation catching her breath, before realizing people murmuring her name with questioning tones. The word model bounced off of her ears, and she pulled her hand back from the man's carefully. A familiar voice interrupted their small moment of peace and appreciation above all the others, though.  
"Marinette!"  
Marinette's smile was lost, and her face flooded with panic instead.

Nathalie. Marinette's head turned quickly towards the woman. She couldn't see the familiar car down the road beyond unfamiliar faces that had all turned from her, but her name was suddenly echoing in other people's voices.  
"Marinette Agreste-Cheng?"  
"The model for Gabriel!"  
"Who cares about celebrities..."  
"Is it really her?"  
"Dude, she's really cute-"  
"Marinette!"  
Maybe, just maybe, Marinette could make it the rest of the way to school before Nathalie caught her. Maybe, just maybe, she could get into the school without being stopped by the crowd she would hide behind.  
"It is, that's her!"  
She tossed her gaze back toward the school. Less traffic. Less people.  
Luck was on her side.  
"I have to run, _Monsieur_ , have a good day!"  
He stood by as she bolted down the street once again, with a few clamoring people and a car in hot pursuit.

It took some changing of her route to get away from the people, running through alternate routes circling the school to slowly thin out the herd until she had completely gotten away from even the most dedicated of people - she questioned partially to herself who had enough free time to pursue her so dedicatedly without pay - but soon enough, there was no one pursuing her.  
She'd managed to shake Nathalie all too easily, but knew hubris would be her downfall; when the coast seemed clear, she sprinted for the school, down the side, and turned quickly for the front.  
She had already run plenty that day, a steady, but quick pace to cover as much of her route as possible before anyone noticed she was missing - and when she saw them near, the stakes felt all the more real, and she had given her all and then some to go as quickly as her legs would carry her. It was fortune that kept her from causing herself bodily harm, but it wasn't quite enough.  
It wasn't fortune that Nathalie wasn't on her tail after a few turns.  
It was Nathalie's foresight, making her anticipate Marinette's destination, so all they had to do was _wait_. Even if Marinette had a head-start, Nathalie had a _car_.

The same car that Marinette saw parked in front of the school.  
She didn't have it in her to slow down completely until she reached the foot of the stairs, where she finally stopped.  
In spite of how much her legs tingled and had spontaneously turned to gelatin beneath her weight, she would have climbed those stairs if not for her father's assistant and Marinette's own bodyguard standing at the top, sentries in the way of the sole entry to the school that Marinette knew of, unless she found the means to sky-dive in.  
The fact they separated her from her destination brought her nearly toppling as she heaved for breath.

Her lungs were empty, her throat was dry, her teeth were numb, and her skin was covered with a small sheen of sweat. She was exhausted.

Slowly, she brought herself to stand up properly, eyes searching for people beyond the door - students, seemingly stragglers, and one red-haired teacher that was ushering them off to class. All of those detours had made her late, and the impossible-to-pass duo standing before her made her absent.  
Neither had made any move, simply waiting for her to surrender. Nathalie's eyes were filled with an unwavering, stern disapproval; Guillaume's with controlled, contained agitation, just as much as an unyielding relief that she stood there, safe, before him.  
She knew already that anything she could say wouldn't reach them. Nathalie would have to answer directly to Gabriel for allowing Marinette to reach the school, and Guillaume wouldn't rest easy with Marinette in a building he couldn't enter with her, with unfamiliar people and no lines of defense. She searched them both for any indication that they might relent, just as she searched her thoughts for the possibility of another way in that didn't involve scaling a wall.  
And she found...  
Nothing.

When she regained her breath completely and brought herself to stand upright, she met Nathalie's eyes with a bit of humility. "... Please don't tell my father, Nathalie."  
The words slipped out thoughtlessly, in vain. Her disappearance would have to be explained somehow, she knew. But with her concession, the two sentries moved forward to escort her back to the car. When the door closed behind her, she gazed hopelessly, longingly, out the window at the building.  
She hoped, at the least, that she'd see Chloé curiously investigating, so she could see that an attempt was made. Or even just a flash of the girl beyond the door or through the windows.  
It would have been nice if she made it on time, if she could spend a full day in someone's company, no strings attached.

Disappointment settled in as the car started to move. She let herself focus on the seams of the seat in front of her while her fingers carefully picked at fabric. She was late.  
If only that old man hadn't been at that crosswalk. She would have made it on time, wouldn't have been noticed, wouldn't have had to try to shake people off.  
No, that wasn't fair. He just... There were reasons behind him crossing at the time. Hopefully, he'd get to wherever he had been going safely.  
In truth, it was just her luck. Luck was never really on her side.  
Not today.  
Not ever.  
She probably would have been late, regardless of traffic. Regardless of people. Regardless of old-men-related incidents.  
Today just meant she'd have to work harder. That she'd have to leave earlier tomorrow.

Nathalie's chastising words bounced off of deaf ears as she resolved to wake earlier, to move smarter, to keep her name to herself, if she could help it. Eventually, Nathalie surrendered in favor of calling Gabriel. At the sound of Nathalie pronouncing his name, Marinette's ears perked, and she paid far too close of attention.

* * *

Marinette sat at the long dining room table, parroting memorized answers back to Nathalie. As usual, Marinette handled it with immense disinterest, but put forth the slightest effort into not sounding like she didn't care. She didn't respond to Chloé's text asking where she was, as texting would be rude. She didn't thumb the phone that was in her pocket, as impatiently and distractedly thinking about it was impolite. She didn't scowl or groan about the review because she wasn't going to treat Nathalie to that kind of rotten behavior - Nathalie was just doing her job.  
Naturally, that meant Marinette just spoke through her most monotonous and perfect voice. Meant for people in positions of authority. Especially the man that walked in at the far end of the room and addressed Nathalie, disrupting the review, and sending Nathalie to standby.

"Marinette," he began, and she knew exactly what this was, trying not to flinch or brace herself too visibly.  
She knew when she asked it of Nathalie that her father's assistant wouldn't hide anything from Gabriel Agreste that might cost her her job. That included Marinette's whereabouts and the reason why she wasn't at home that morning. She knew, she understood, and she didn't expect any different. She'd even personally heard the words leaving Nathalie's mouth while Gabriel questioned her over the phone, and she couldn't hold it against her.  
But that didn't mean she had to like it.  
"You're expressly forbidden from going to school. I won't have another stunt like the one you pulled today, and that's final. It's dangerous beyond these walls."

Marinette could have infinitely many words to have with the older Agreste. She could counter every last thing, fight him tooth and nail, shout, scream, and cry, but she doubted it would have much impact. The way he conducted his affairs meant that action would invariably backfire on her. Insolence, and all that. So she stayed quiet.  
She already had plans for tomorrow.  
She just had to leave earlier, conduct herself more intelligently.  
"Yes, father." Usually, this was the end of everything. She would do something Gabriel didn't approve of, or do something he wanted her to do _inadequately_ , he would tell her so, and she would never repeat the mistake again. She knew they would expect this time to be like all the others, leaving her same window of time to sneak out free - just like this morning. But this time, she bore the weight of lying on her, and she resented herself for it. She resented Gabriel for pushing her to lie by making another demand of her. She resented Nathalie for having to answer to Gabriel.  
"Good. You may resume, Nathalie."

In the moment, it didn't matter that she was going again, regardless. The conversation was as tense and heavy as her stomach, and while Nathalie wouldn't go against M. Agreste's wishes, it didn't stop her from immediately releasing Marinette to her room - something Marinette would appreciate if she didn't already intend on shoving away from the table, grabbing her things, and absconding to her room with or without permission the second the door to Gabriel's atelier closed.

The feeling in her stomach felt like it sent the entire world rumbling in small, faint bursts.  
Marinette dragged herself through her room, pushing projects - jewelry and garments alike, as well as the tools she had been using on them - onto the floor before dropping her bag and books on the desk before she dropped herself onto her bed.  
All Marinette could do was shudder a bit into her comforter. To try and bring some calm into her world, she rolled her fingers over her scalp, raking through her hair and undoing the tie that held it all back. It wasn't the most effective thing, but she kept on, regardless. Her other hand sought out her phone so she could answer Chloé's texts - each asking where she was, what she was doing, wasn't her schedule mostly clear today, was she grounded.

She had typed out many possible responses in her phone, none satisfactory, and erased them all as though the feelings behind each would be eradicated in the cathartic process.  
Confidantes as they practically were, Marinette did everything in her power to keep from being overly emotional in front of Chloé. Well-meaning as the mayor's daughter was with her, Marinette knew her best friend: she overreacted. She was dramatic. She did things that were senseless and cruel, thinking they would better her life or the lives of those she actually cared about in any capacity. Talking about herfather forbidding her from going to school would seem incongruous with her showing up the following day, and would likely stir unintended issues between their families.  
While Gabriel seemed insurmountable to Marinette, she knew Chloé saw Gabriel as someone easy to overthrow with the flick of a wrist, the call of her father's name, only someone to be wary of because of his authority over Marinette. Whether or not Chloé had the gall or the ability to do as she wished remained a question Marinette would never dare to ask.

She hadn't gotten through her process before she was pulled out of it from the feeling of the house shaking. Books fell from her desk, charms rolled across the floor, a couple of her mannequins toppled, and her cellphone fell from her fingers.

"Nath-"

The tremor repeated itself, and ended just as quickly.

"Nathalie!?"

No answer, but the world tremored yet again. This time, when the noise faded, Marinette could hear police sirens growing impossibly louder. She moved to her feet - just in time to tumble as the house shook again. She quickly got back to her feet and crossed the room, her own issues rushing to the backburner.

What little she could make out from behind her windows wasn't much to go on: the perimeter of the Agreste manor was marked by a tall, thick wall, and all that could be seen had to be over seven meters tall - she saw a moving grey mass between the shudders that made more and more of her things tumble from their places. It slowed when the sirens turned off, in favor of shouting.  
A clamor followed, then what sounded like gunshots.  
Suddenly, Marinette could see more of the mass - maybe it stood up. Maybe... She didn't know. She couldn't _see_. She wasn't about to run out of her room with the ill-conceived notion that she could bypass Guillaume and get through the front door.

So Marinette did the only thing she could think of at the time: she pushed her cheek harder into the window and moved onto the ledge of the various flowerbed pots that lined the majority of the back wall of her room, trying to get a better view from the slight change in height, in position relative to the manor perimeter wall, in vain.  
She stared as intently as possible, willing herself to see through the perimeter wall.

Then, the behemoth bellowed.

It was one syllable, but it was too loud to take meaning from. Maybe just a shout of anger.  
The noise rolled the world, and Marinette tumbled from her wall to the floor of her room, nearly taking a large pot with her to the ground.  
No damage was incurred, but she decided that wasn't the safest or most effective way to monitor the situation. She rushed to her T.V. to watch the news - as luck would have it, all of the local programs were being interrupted for the special announcement that the population of Paris was to stay safely tucked away into secure locations. To anyone who could not get home immediately, public places like malls and the news station were opening their lobbies for people to hide from what appeared to be a beefy snowman, only made of rocks. Word was, it called itself Stoneheart.  
Curious to see what other outlets were saying - possibly something later or earlier in the looping announcement - she reached for the remote, only to find a small dark box with red symbols etched into the lid where she imagined her remote was.

What is that? What is it doing here?

Her eyes darted to her bedroom door. She knew the door to be locked when she snuck out, locked when she came running back mere minutes ago, locked the second she slammed the door behind herself to renew her isolation - an isolation she pretended she had any influence on with a locked door.  
But Paris was being overtaken by a bunch of pebbles, and stuff mysteriously appeared in her room.  
She reached for the box; as if on cue, the moment her fingers touched the crest on its lid, her windows were overcast with sheets of gray, and the noises of the world outside were muted.  
She flinched back from the box in time with Nathalie's voice from behind the door.

"Marinette?"  
"Nathalie?"  
"Your father is activating the security system-" she started, stopped. Marinette's eyes fixed on the box. An intruder?  
The woman's voice behind the door resumed, "It sounds as if the news is on in there, so you must be aware of what that was."  
It took effort, but blue eyes traveled to the screen that felt brighter than it was when Marinette's room was swarmed with natural light; now, it was the primary source thereof.  
"We have to stress that you stay in your room."  
No response.  
Nathalie's voice was dangerously softer, but still barely audible enough for Marinette to hear her plea. "Please, do not try to run off again. Not until the Stoneheart matter is resolved." It carried a tenderness that could cost her dearly. The implications that she knew Marinette ran off more often than just before could cost her double.  
"... Don't worry, Nathalie. I'll be right here." Marinette's voice wasn't harsh, but she wasn't about to reciprocate the compassionate undertone. It made her feel queasy just thinking about it.  
"Will you unlock your door?"  
Resolutely, Marinette refused with a simple "No." It wasn't that she was planning on vanishing - school tomorrow would surely be cancelled, and leaving would truly be unsafe. But the lock was hers to control.  
It was Nathalie's turn to stay silent for a minute, but Marinette had nothing to add. She had a secret in her room, she planned to escape the moment Stoneheart was fixed, she was now in utter darkness and needed to find the lights, and there would be no dinner until a few hours from now, still. It would be a dinner she would likely eat alone, even during an emergency. It dragged for a minute or so, and Marinette guessed that Nathalie had dismissed herself.

With her privacy reinstated and the lights turned on, Marinette returned to the box on her table.  
Suspicious or not, Marinette had nowhere to go and nothing to do. She could get online, she could resume working on her projects that would never meet the skin of others, she could watch movies,  
Or she could open this box and watch the news as Paris was slowly dismantled.

The ornate lid came open with ease, and her eyes fell on unfamiliar gems: red as rubies with a couple black dots a piece; they were earrings, and they looked like little ladybugs.  
What was more pressing, however, was the actual bug that seemed to fly out of the box, sucking the red from the earrings with it.  
Which caused Marinette to chuck the box immediately across the room.

* * *

When Marinette managed to capture the bug - which it seemed entirely welcoming of, so long as the action and the thin pink glass containing it put Marinette at ease - the interrogation began.  
"How did you get in here?"  
"I was delivered by the person who chose you."  
"Who chose me?"  
"A Guardian. I can't say any more than that right now."  
She began to ask how they got in, only stopping as she considered it - most likely the same way she got out this morning. Instead, she moved on. "Alright, then what are you?"  
"I am a kwami. Specifically, I'm the Ladybug kwami, so I usually rest in the Ladybug Miraculous."  
"Ladybug Miraculous."  
"The earrings in the box I came from are the Ladybug Miraculous."  
"So you're a ghost?"  
"No; as a kwami, I endow the bearer of the Ladybug Miraculous with the powers of good fortune and creation. Like other kwamis, I can be seen by everyone, but I also only exist with my corresponding Miraculous."  
"And there are other kwamis in the world?"  
"Yes! Not many - only as many as there are Miraculous. Only a handful of the Miraculous are in circulation, so you wouldn't benefit from looking around to try and find other kwamis. We typically try to stay hidden, too."  
Marinette's questions subsided as Tikki unveiled a wealth of information, willfully.  
"However, there will be two you'll likely encounter in the immediate future - the Black Cat and the Butterfly. The Black Cat is the inverse counterpart to the Ladybug, and was released right around the same time that mine was. Through it, its chosen can wield the Black Cat's powers of misfortune and destruction. They will be serving as your partner in the fight to come. The other one that will show itself to you soon, the Butterfly, is the Miraculous of fealty. Through it, using the tenshi and akuma, its master can designate a champion. This could be anyone who the Butterfly thinks would be receptive to its call - and they would receive the power to achieve its goals, quid pro quo to enacting the will of the Butterfly."

Marinette's gaze shifted automatically to her T.V., where Stoneheart was still being monitored and commented on from afar. He'd gotten far enough from the Agreste manor that the house had long since stopped trembling.  
Her eyes returned to Tikki when the kwami spoke, a forlorn tone overtaking her otherwise sweet, chirping voice. "That's right, Marinette. The Butterfly is active, and it looks like Stoneheart is its champion."  
Somberness gave way to dedication, and Tikki's eyes met Marinette's again. "The Butterfly's objective remains unclear, but the danger it poses to others right now and the aimlessness of its champion suggests that the master of the Butterfly Miraculous has high aspirations and will use whatever means to accomplish them. Even if it hurts everyone else. That's where you and the Black Cat come in. You, with the Ladybug Miraculous, have the power to purify the akuma in the way only the Ladybug can. The Black Cat, as your counterpart and the most powerful Miraculous otherwise, will be there to give you aid."

These small words carried a compelling note, and while Marinette worked through the details and implications, she carefully placed a book atop the glass and crossed the room to search for the Ladybug earrings she'd thrown earlier.  
They had fortunately stayed snug in their box, so she didn't need to search long. When she circled back, a voice came through the door.

"Marinette?"  
Nathalie again? She thought it was likely that any of her other duties for the day would have been called off in the wake of what was happening across Paris. If Gabriel sincerely wanted to send her out for photos, she might just grab the kwami under the glass and go. And never come back. "Yes?"  
Nathalie's voice came out a bit apprehensive. "I was... Wondering... If... Do you need anything?"  
The question was highly unusual. Nathalie never came to ask things like that, and her voice was rarely so anxious. Perhaps, though - Marinette looked to the thick sheets of metal over her windows. In spite of the building's fortitude, it wouldn't be unreasonable to be afraid in a situation like this. Maybe she would be, too, if she wasn't in the immediate company of an alien that claimed she could end all of the turmoil.  
She remained quiet for a moment, then headed for the door.  
As if sensing her direction and the Miraculous in her hand, Tikki suddenly appeared in front of Marinette, cutting her off, staying between her and the door. A glance to the glass the kwami should have been beneath suggested that there was no way she'd gotten out - the book was still on top of the glass, right where she'd left it.  
"Marinette?"  
Tikki's eyes bore into Marinette's, almost pleadingly.  
"... No, I'm alright. Thank you, Nathalie."

When a minute of silence had passed, Marinette focused again on Tikki.  
"How did you get out?"  
"Physical limits like that don't affect me as much as they do you. I stayed there because I wanted you to feel more at ease."  
"And why did you get out?"  
"No one can know about these -" Tikki floated to the earrings, as if she were guarding them, and her protective expression as she looked to the human requested agreement, "- or me. Exposing yourself as the master of the Ladybug Miraculous would be dangerous for you and the people around you."

Marinette cocked one eyebrow skeptically.  
With a glance up, she found no better way to demonstrate their invulnerability than carrying Tikki and the earrings towards her window. "Just before you emerged, this was all just glass, rather than being covered in steel. It's a thick hull, part of the security system. It came up the moment Stoneheart appeared outside the manor. If someone wanted to do us harm, they'd have a hard time getting in. And if you worry that Nathalie would expose you to someone who wanted to hurt you, me, or Gabriel, you can rest assured - she is the posterchild of keeping her toes in line."  
"That may be so," Tikki answered, and turned her attention from the steel hull to Marinette, "but Stoneheart isn't the worst to come, Marinette. He does possess incredible durability and brawn, but all Stoneheart is, is the Butterfly flexing its wings. The champions that will come in the future, if the Butterfly isn't stopped, will become more extravagant, more dangerous, more unpredictable than the last. The powers of the Miraculous become stronger with grander innovation on the part of their masters. The more the Butterfly realizes they can do, the more creative and powerful they become."  
The dedicated and resolute tone and expression on the small, feeble looking and sounding kwami was out of place - but Marinette was quickly coming to suspect that she couldn't doubt very much behind the kwami's words. They were all so consistent, so wild, she couldn't figure out where the lies could be.

"... Okay. You have my word."  
Tikki visibly relaxed. The human carried her back to the table where the box first lay when she discovered it, and set the both of them down. Rather than sitting or walking, Tikki stayed floating, and resumed on explaining the Miraculous to Marinette.

Tikki the kwami was incredibly talkative and welcoming, knowledgeable, but more enthusiastic than Marinette was ready for in a strange creature that had somehow ended up in her room and didn't look entirely like anything she'd seen before.  
While Marinette could focus plenty on the informational onslaught Tikki provided, now and again her mind would wander to inspecting the small entity's freely floating body; Tikki's body was the size of her head, and it looked like a cartoonized fusion of so many creatures she couldn't describe it as particularly resembling any one: large eyes struck her as buggish, but they took on a deceptively human appearance; tendrils bounded uniformly from either side of the black dot on her otherwise smooth, featureless scalp; little spines lined her back; small appendages with round ends seemed like arms, but without prongs, suction cups, or barbs to grab; and her legs looked like they were meant entirely for hopping - not that the kwami ever stopped _flying_ without any wings to speak of.

On the other side of the same introductory coin, Tikki openly applauded Marinette over how quickly she seemed to comprehend everything, the critical questions that made explaining everything simple and thorough, but far from superfluous, and how quickly those questions stopped as she seemed to digest every facet of the subject at hand. She remarked on how receptive Marinette seemed, how she seemed inexplicably capable and unusually level-headed about the impending responsibilities of the Ladybug, even before the details of transforming proper were bequeathed.  
Marinette didn't answer the shower of compliments, instead electing to ask one thing that had lingered on her mind since Tikki's proposal of saving Paris had first been vocalized in actual, real words, after she understood the duties, the actions, the vague ins-and-outs of what she would be doing when she took on those responsibilities.

"There is still the problem of getting into the battle. I don't doubt why you're here, but there remains the question of how I'm supposed to get _there_. This building is on lock-down until Stoneheart has been dealt with - and from the way you say it, only someone with a Miraculous can do that. Unless I can perform all of these duties remotely..." Marinette trailed off, noticing the remarkable speed at which Tikki's expression of enthusiasm faltered and crumbled into miniscule doubt and worry.

"No," Tikki answered, "your powers unfortunately don't work that way. There is someone whose powers do, but we cannot rely on them to help, because they're the one who made Stoneheart."  
"Then are you sure you're in the right place?"  
Tikki seemed almost offended as she bounded forward. "Yes! Absolutely! You are the Ladybug, I can tell. All Ladybugs are different, but they all have an inner power, a logical sense of justice, an analytical mind, and a great deal of compassion. You were chosen because you exhibit these traits and more."

Marinette leaned back in the chaise seated by her coffee table, struggling to focus on the kwami that was close enough she thought her eyes were crossing. "But I can't exactly get out."  
"You did this morning; you'll just have to find another way, if the same route doesn't work. This is a noble cause, Marinette. You'll be fighting to protect the citizens of Paris and helping to bring the one who put them in danger to justice. You can do it, you just have to believe, and do your best."  
The human mulled it over for all of a moment, but her eyes hitting the gray of the exterior wall made her relent again. "That was before the security system was started. This morning, there wasn't a monster parading around the streets."  
The kwami sighed, and they fell again into quiet as Marinette looked at the T.V. She had nowhere to go, nothing to do, no idea how to save Paris from behind thick dark hulls meant to protect them.  
Hulls that could protect the Agrestes, but no one beyond the perimeter of the manor. And she hated it.  
She settled back, fingers wandering into her hair, then the thought crossed her mind. "We might just have to wait on the Black Cat. When Stoneheart is defeated, the system will likely be dropped. Although, it seems as though you being here and my being the Ladybug's chosen is a moot point, if I'll only ever be able to wait out the storm."

Tikki's voice came out more sad than anything. "Marinette, the Ladybug is needed. The reason the Ladybug and Black Cat are so powerful while there are only two in their series is because of their easily developed and awesome synergy. Without you, the Black Cat _will_ fail."

Marinette wet her lips, focusing her attention again on the T.V. Or so she hoped to, but she couldn't listen to the same repeated announcements about Stoneheart that recycled information and speculation that all felt _empty_ compared to what Tikki had been saying.  
"The fate of Paris rests in my hands?" Her voice was a little too thick with disbelief and doubt, so she followed up with a joke, "I can hardly run in a straight line or get out of my house." She looked to Tikki, whose dedication had turned into pleading.  
"... I'll need to find where our security is weakest, or if there's an exit or escape route I can take without triggering any alarms. But that may take time. We may be stuck until the Black Cat manages to neutralize Stoneheart, anyway."

"I only ask that you try, Marinette."

She couldn't think about staying where she was while Paris crumbled outside her doors.  
"Yeah. I'll try."

* * *

It had been two days since the hull went up, and the flowers around Marinette's room were already beginning to droop. They had been spoiled by the full wall of windows, drinking in indirect sunlight through the North-facing walls all day, every day. Now, they looked as depleted as the Black Cat on the news.  
Stations had first rallied around the Black Cat's appearance, excited as much as they were fearful. And while two days was hardly long at all, Paris being in a state of panic enough for the military being gathered to section off and slowly evacuate parts of the city and form perimeters around districts that were too difficult to evacuate, too dense, or too close to Stoneheart, all word regarding the Black Cat had stopped being enthusiastic. News grew stale and repetitive, save for one amateur outlet - a personal blog that was still inexplicably running. In spite of Stoneheart's traveling Paris and the destruction that amounted around him and the Black Cat, the blog owner had somehow managed to follow almost the entire conflict, filming from a phone, only stopping when the conflict got too far away or their battery ran low.

Tikki remained as on-edge as she could be while Marinette poured over her crudely drawn amateur floorplan. She couldn't get out through the windows, she couldn't get out through the exit in the back, and the front door was an obvious no.  
Through some adventuring through the house - she'd negotiated her freedom in the building while she had nothing else to do, and eventually managed to convince Nathalie that it wasn't as though she needed someone watching over her shoulder in the safety of their prison - she found a few rooms she'd never known of before, some lined with stairs, and a particularly thin one with a ladder that led through the top floor into the attic. While it made sense that they had one, she hadn't even _known_ they had an attic, or a fair number of these other rooms, including ones that seemed completely sealed off from the rest of the house after many years of remodeling.  
Even though she had no idea what she would be able to accomplish by exploring the attic, assuming there was nothing to be discovered would mean admitting defeat. So far, unless she elected to break down walls and re-open the way into long-quarantined rooms, she had all but exhausted her options.

For now, she was only waiting until the next scheduled event - dinner - so she could escape undetected afterwards, probing Tikki with experimental questions.

"A yo-yo?" she asked. She wasn't unimpressed, she was... Confused. As to when and how yo-yos had ever become a weapon.  
"Yes, although, there have been cases where the Ladybug's artifact manifested much, much differently! It's likely that it will be a yo-yo, but you might end up with something else entirely. But it's not like the appearance of the artifact really matters," Tikki offered. "The use of the artifact is limited to what its specialty is, with the occasional exception of user intent, but usually only with side-functions. The Ladybug usually just has the yo-yo because yo-yos and Ladybugs look vaguely similar."  
"So it's an aesthetic thing."  
"I guess!"  
"... I can't argue with that. But what are the functions of the yo-yo?"  
"Well," Tikki thought for a moment. "I guess... The best way to say your primary ability would be the base level where your good fortune and creation intersect: the Lucky Charm. It helps turn the tide in any situation, as long as you can imagine what to do with the tools it provides. Otherwise, you can use the yo-yo as an unlimited and indestructible rope, for example."  
"Or anything else that has rope involved?"  
"Most likely!"  
"... A grappling hook?"  
"Oh, probably!"  
And their conversation fell into familiar silence.

This was how most of the conversations had become. Now that Marinette was familiar with the basics - the Miraculous, the Ladybug, the Black Cat, the Butterfly, what their aspects and artifacts commonly were, what their powers were at their most base level, the process of transforming and detransforming - everything else was left vague. Eventually, helpfulness would give way to vague encouragement with no clear direction. Tikki had explained it away as preventing giving the impression that the Ladybug was in any way limited: as it was, Ladybug's powers were very nearly the most versatile tool.  
No extra details.

So far, she hadn't even yet transformed once, and if she didn't find the means to get out, that would very well be her next effort. Trying out transforming and detransforming. Using her ability.

Marinette regarded the T.V. once again - as the hero did every couple of hours, the Black Cat withdrew from battle. Surely, it was tiring, fighting forever. She wondered if the Black Cat knew she was supposed to be there, aiding him.  
She wondered if they would be able to take Stoneheart down quickly enough Marinette could get back to the mansion before the next time Nathalie would call on her - breakfast the following morning.

When Nathalie summoned her for dinner, Marinette brought Tikki, a flashlight, the earring box, and the floorplan along with her in a small bag. When Nathalie asked about it, Marinette explained that she would resume exploring after dinner, and had a flashlight to make the adventure seem a little more suspenseful. The house hadn't trembled since days before, and she had her phone, in case something happened.  
Nathalie seemed as though she was trying to join in the amusement, for only a moment, as she offered a sad smile, but that ended the conversation.  
As promised, the moment she was done eating and subtly sneaking food into her purse for the kwami to snack on overnight, Marinette left to wander the house, as if she didn't already have a destination definitely in mind.

She exited through the other door, and only steered clear of the atelier. She wandered the side rooms and eventually began sneaking around to circle back into the kitchen, through the rooms behind it; she passed the back door she'd used to sneak out days before, and quickly ascended the stairs to unused rooms, each as dark as the last, the hull shielding any windows, and a lack of lightbulbs preventing ease in exploration. She manned her flashlight, and resumed along the route she'd given herself before, all the way to the hatch into the attic; she turned off her flashlight and returned it to her purse, focusing all of her power in pushing up on the hatch and ensuring she didn't fall. Minutes passed, to no avail.

Frustration and desperation set in, but no matter the pressure, the hatch didn't open. Hopelessly, she pressed her head against the top rungs of the ladder, breathing carefully and deeply.  
"Marinette?" Tikki curiously poked her head out into the dark. "Are you okay?"  
Marinette's voice was comparatively compromised, and she had to tell herself she wasn't about to shout or tear up. "I think this is the last place I can look without a sledgehammer. But it won't open." She pushed, carefully, with one hand, and it shifted, but wouldn't give. "It doesn't feel like it's being weighed down by anything, but there's not a lock, either."  
Tikki hummed, then murmured. "Don't worry, Marinette. Just a second, okay?"  
Marinette resumed resting her forehead on the rungs, expecting nothing. Maybe she would need a sledgehammer. Maybe she'd have to make it obvious that she was breaking rules by breaking boards. But she doubted that she would get anywhere, even if she did find a way into the sectioned-off rooms.

Until a small thud came from above her, and Tikki's voice returned to her.  
"Try now."  
She pushed again, and the hatch moved with ease.

Marinette quickly climbed the rest of the way up the ladder, and found fresh air above her.  
Oh. So there wasn't an attic.  
The sky was still blue, threatening orange beyond as dusk loomed by a falling sun. She couldn't see extremely far, but she could peer just over some rooftops and into the distance. Smoke billowed, helicopters circled, and a colossal man of rocks seemed to get all the larger. Aside from the distant booms, Paris was swept with a deathly silence that reminded Marinette of the stakes.  
"Alright, Marinette! It's time!" Tikki announced.  
Marinette nodded, eyes attuned to the giant across the city. "Tikki, spots on."


	4. When She Comes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At long last, the Ladybug holder joins the fray.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning, in case it's not entirely clear because I'm not sure how well I handled the transition: the first section of this chapter (ft. Alya) is late afternoon on day one of Stoneheart's rampage, then early afternoon on day two. The rest, following the first separating line in the fic, is early-to-late evening on day three.  
> Yes, Adrien is a very tired boy.

The brief recesses Alya posed in the battle were certainly welcome - it gave him a little extra diversity in his routine, but also gave him an opportunity to look, act, _feel_ like he knew what he was doing. He wouldn't tell her what a novice he was, how he had only been at heroism for a couple hours now - especially because that might disappoint the hero enthusiast he knew his new friend was.  
"You're getting slower," he taunted, a smile bloomed over his masked features so he could beam at the civilian who exasperatedly wriggled in his grasp. He slowed, in case she happened to throw them off-balance in the process.  
"Or maybe you're getting more perceptive, Catboy."  
"Maybe," Adrien answered, skepticism and humor thick in his tone. "Or you already know I'm not going to let you make it all the way to Stoneheart, and you're just coming back to visit me."

When her wiggles became a little much, he decided to stop on the nearest convenient rooftop. "And be hauled around like a bag of flour?" Alya argued, rolling her eyes - just as alight with excitement as his. He wondered, for all of a moment, if she ever thought she'd _talk_ to a superhero.  
"Who knows? Maybe this is a dream come true."  
They laughed, and while it was nice, Adrien wasn't about to risk her life just for the humor, and began to wrap an arm around her again.  
"Hoooold up," she protested, swatting his hand away.  
"Mlle., as much as I love your company, this isn't a safe place. No damsels in the vicinity who may _potentially_ end up in distress."  
"Only damsels? So, say, if I was a guy in a black spandex suit..."  
"No admission!" he interrupted, crossing his arms into an X in front of him. His eyes drifted down from hers to his intersecting arms. "Also, I don't know if this is spandex."

She crossed her arms in turn, set her jaw, and leaning her weight onto one leg. One of her hands still poised over her phone, a finger stroking over a worn-down silver ridge on the side. "I've got to fill the viewers in with something, Catboy!"  
"You could say..." He trailed off, bringing one arm down and the other up so he could tap his lips with his index exaggeratedly. "This region has violated numerous safety codes and the pests here are a real hazard, and no one should come here until it's been taken care of?" He grinned at her, and she blew a raspberry at him.  
"Ehh!"  
"Your buzzer imitation needs a little work."  
"I'll get to it after the viewers get _something_. I haven't gotten close enough for any footage recently, so how about at least some information from the guardcat?"  
"Like what?"  
"Like? Like what this new villain's whole deal is! Something groundbreaking. What's he trying to accomplish? Does he just want to ransack the city? Is he on a circuit? He seems to stick to the one area, so it would make sense if there was something important here."

Adrien stretched out a bit, his hand moving to the back of his head as he considered what he could offer up to her; his claws dragged through his hair, carefully raking his scalp so as to scratch _just right_ without potentially breaking skin.  
"And then you'll stay back for a bit?"  
"No, then I'll at least let you carry me off again."  
"You drive a hard bargain, Mlle."  
"Césaire," she answered, unlocked her phone, and poised the camera at herself.

"Welcome back, viewers! A brief recap for those just tuning in - my name is Alya Césaire, live on the scene with the black-suited cat hero that appeared only a few short hours ago, right after the villainous Stoneheart. This reporter has gathered some valuable information for any curious citizens from none other than..."  
She flicked a button, and a small, unimposing light appeared next to the camera on her phone.  
Adrien smiled, pulled his hand from his hair, and waved. "All the fanfare, Mlle. Césaire."  
"Thanks. Now, as promised, you had a little information to share with the people of Paris?"

"Right," he murmured, piecing together information that might seem _adequate_. "Well..."  
God, this was live? How was he supposed to maintain the appearance of knowing anything when actually asked for answers?  
As if she sensed his dilemma, she interrupted. "We all get a little stage fright our first times in front of a camera. Just act as though you were talking to me, no audience."  
Maybe it would have helped if he didn't have the constant reminder of an audience through the light next to her camera. Reluctantly, he started to speak. "Well, like his outward appearance and his name, he is completely made of stone - but it seems fairly indestructible? Over time, it also looks as though he's getting bigger."  
"Do you think there is a possibility he has a maximum height?"  
"It'd make sense, or he'd someday end up twice the size of the planet and floating in space."  
"Thwarted at last, but at what cost!"  
"Not to worry, Mlle. Césaire. I'll have him taken care of even before he's the size of Pluto."  
"How long will that take?"  
"Hard to say? I'm ruling out his vulnerabilities right now, so it's only a matter of time. Let's hope it's within the next couple of hours, I'm getting kind of hungry."

Alya laughed, and he took a moment to laugh too; it felt like, just maybe, he wasn't being silly to cover that niggling uncertainty - like he had done this a thousand times before. Maybe that's what the viewers saw. He sure hoped so.  
"Last question, and we'll let you get back to fighting the dwarf-planet-to-be."  
"Shoot."  
"Do you know what he's after?"  
"It's hard to say." How much was too much, how much was not enough? What _did_ he know about Stoneheart? "He's acting like he's searching for something. I thought at first that it could have been some _one_ , but since the area's being cleared by law enforcement, it wouldn't make much sense for him to stick around here."  
"Excellent and very informative, if I must say so myself!" The light turned off, and he assumed the stream was over, or the camera wasn't on him anymore. He breathed out in relief. It was both exhilarating and chilling, being in the spotlight like that - how Alya eagerly grinned at her phone and pressed on, without a trace of hesitation or fear, was beyond him. "And there you have it - but we, as Paris' citizens, must fight for our home, too. If anyone has any ideas about what Stoneheart may be looking for, don't be afraid to contribute and discuss! It may help our new hero to save our city faster."

Her eyes came off of her phone, and she fluidly stored the device in her pocket.  
"Alright, you held up your end of the deal, so I should do the same."  
Adrien moved an arm around her again, and she swatted at him once more. His critical expression was answered with a smug smile.  
"I'm going to decide how I'm held, though. No more dangling or fireman's carry, got it!"  
"I still only have the one hand to carry you with."  
Alya rolled her eyes and pointed at the rooftop they were standing on. Or, maybe her shoes? He looked down, too, but glanced back up to her in the moment.  
"A piggy-back ride, duh."

Adrien had to admit - it was easier. While he could only spare one arm to secure a leg in place, her feet were wound about the front part of his torso, and her arms were about his shoulders in a way that was conscientious enough not to push on his throat. They crossed the city with no concern for her safety or comfort, no need to slow down to reposition. He was depositing her by the centerpiece of the Place des Vosges in no time.

"You seriously put me on the opposite side of the Seine?"  
"What can I say? I take your safety seriously, and you made it easier for me."  
"The price I pay for comfort..."  
Adrien simply rewarded her with another smile and a salute before taking off once more.

The next time he saw her, he had finally done it. A fatal placement of his Cataclysm meant Stoneheart wouldn't be getting up again - at least, not any time soon. He felt reassured after a full two minutes of the mass of rocks not moving an inch.  
The reporter had made it just in time to capture the spectacle of the crumbling colossus, and Adrien stood triumphantly between her and the wreckage of the stone man's body. It was a game, and he had won.  
He turned toward her, grinning, and approached with lithe, comfortable, confident steps for what would certainly be a post-victory interview.  
It was his fourth Cataclysm, so he knew he had little time to spare. But he could run anywhere in a two-mile radius and know no one would see his kwami fall away from him, the mask come undone.

It was his fourth Cataclysm, so expertly placed, and he was so sure, until a significantly _larger_ shadow bore over him and Alya. Her excited but inexplicably still spunky expression faded into a modest dose of horror, and Adrien grabbed her in the way she hated, pushed her weight over his shoulder, just like a bag of flour, just like she hated, and sprinted for cover.  
They had a few seconds to reposition when he got enough distance from Stoneheart that he could actually care about the pain his shoulder ramming into her gut inflicted. Luckily, she seemed to understand the urgency.  
Unfortunate for her, every question she asked as he flicked across the sky with her on his back fell on deaf ears.

He had been messing up this whole time - just because Stoneheart stayed down longer didn't mean he wasn't getting back up.  
If anything, the length, the supposed fatality, seemed to correspond to just how huge Stoneheart suddenly became.  
Attempting to fight him wasn't going well, but he didn't know what else to do.  
When he got far enough from the titan to drop Alya off, he did - he turned around, vaulted away, and left her behind.

Again.  
And again.  
And again.

Night fell, day broke and noon passed, and Alya took few more breaks than he did when it came to returning to Stoneheart. Every three or four hours, there she was, a break in the routine.  
The titan stopped growing quite so quickly, now that Adrien pieced together what his mistake was, but Alya stopped being a welcome sight.

He lingered when he deposited her on the plateau of the top of the Notre-Dame cathedral, and she looked expectant. As if in question, she presented her phone, but he quickly covered it with his hands.  
"You need to stay away, Alya. It's dangerous, and I can't keep picking you up."  
In her eyes, he could see the same astoundment over his tone that he had in his gut. They were joking and playing the prior day, maybe not quite 20 hours ago. He humored her interview, they chatted, joked, and he wasn't above thinking he might have flirted with her a little. But now, he was exhausted, irritated, from Stoneheart and Alya's repeated return to where she _shouldn't be_. His shoulders ached from vaulting the two of them around, from the pressure to take out Stoneheart all by himself _and_ babysit a rogue civilian.  
The thought crossed his mind, and while she was taken aback, he managed to piece the words together. "Do your parents even know where you are?"

"I need to do my part," Alya answered. While her conviction was sturdy, he could hear the faults in her tone that made it obvious his conviction in keeping her back was more solid. Maybe by now, she was finally a little afraid. Or the reminder that she had a family waiting for her, probably scared, probably aware of her blog and how she kept running right into danger, picked away at her just the right amount.

The thought of Tom crossed his mind, and he lowered his gaze to the street below. He could see the bakery just across the street, and he partially regretted repeatedly dropping her off in this area, just because it should be safe.  
Where did Tom think Adrien was?  
Was he scared?  
Shouldn't he go back home to show him he was alright?

"Our city is being torn apart, and if there's something I can do, I'm _going_ to do it," Alya amended. "But right now... I don't know what else I'm supposed to do."  
"Go home," was his single answer. Like he wanted to, to see his dad again, to know his dad was safe, to take that sad, sentimental glaze of tears off of his dad's eyes when Tom forced himself to bravely smile in hope.  
"No!"  
His heart was in his throat, so he couldn't speak.  
"If everyone hid, no one would be here to fight Stoneheart. If all it took..." She breathed, hard, and the passion in her voice became sturdier in spite of a few tears that quickly streamed down her face. "If all the good people simply stood by and let it happen, waiting for it to stop..." She decisively wiped a finger under her eye and down her cheek, clearing the tear line from her jaw. "Evil would win. And I'm not about to stand by. I'm going to stand by even less, knowing you aren't waiting it out."

They stood there in silence while he found his voice, waited for his heart to settle back into its appropriate cavity, for the pain in his throat and the stinging at the back of his eyes to subside enough, and all he could say was, "Alright. Let's get you off of this roof, then."  
He dropped to one knee, and she climbed onto his back so he could carefully lower them to the ground.

"What should I tell your fans to call you?" she asked, looking for something to fill the quiet while their extremely slow, extremely uncertain descent to the ground was drawn out.  
He didn't know, didn't answer. He didn't think he could bring himself to talk, anyway.  
"For now, you're mostly nameless, so I've been steering everyone away from Catboy at least. Or Catman."  
Those were kind of embarrassing names, but he didn't have it in him to be glad. He just focused on the ever-growing ground while they fell into an ever-growing quiet.  
When they touched down, Alya dismounted his back smoothly.

"Hey."

Adrien looked at her. Maybe it was just his emotions welling up, but he was tired.

"... I'll stay out of the way for a little while. I've gotta charge my phone anyway. But I'll be back before sun-up."  
He nodded, granting her a fatigued smile.  
She answered in kind.  
"Alright, get going. Save Paris before I beat you to the punch, or, you know, before Stoneheart's Pluto-sized."  
"Would it be too much to just throw him into space?"  
"Then he'd go terrorize some alien planet, Catboy. Let's see what we can do first."  
"Is that my cue to go?"  
"Yeah, pretty much."

* * *

"Are you done yet?"  
Adrien didn't take his eyes off of the east-facing wall of the sandwich shop they'd retreated to, growing more apprehensive at each step Stoneheart took, volume slowly rising with each stride - strides that now spanned full blocks, and Adrien couldn't calculate how quickly the titan was approaching their hideaway.  
Whether or not Stoneheart knew where they were didn't mean Adrien and Plagg were out of danger's path. They could easily be stepped out of existence by colossal feet, something that didn't leave his mind easily, especially when he wasn't suited up. In the suit, he could fall from a building and emerge only a little breathless; out, he could trip over a large hunk of a broken wall and find his arms and legs scraped, covered in blood, the aches of bruising imminent, possibly even a gash or two. He was so much more _vulnerable_ as his mere self without wearing the bite-sized god's magic, but he knew he couldn't just transform without Plagg's go-ahead at the moment.  
Well, he _could_.  
But it would mean he would be right back in the sandwich shop minutes later, waiting for Plagg to inhale more cheese so they could have the energy to fight or flee further from the ongoing conflict outside.  
He knew he couldn't - shouldn't, whatever! - but that didn't mean he could stay put.  
He was pacing inside, as if small steps like his within the limits of the shop could grant a better vantage point, so he could keep an eye on Stoneheart, and measure how far away he was by rooftops; it was all he could do not to begin thinking about the looming futility of the battle, how he still couldn't keep Alya away from the danger zone no matter how far away he dropped her off before returning to Stoneheart, how he still didn't know what to do since every tactic he'd exhausted only seemed to make things worse.

"No," Plagg answered, as irritable as he was tired.  
They were both tired.  
Two consecutive days plus some odd number of hours of nearly nonstop combat did that to you, magic or not.  
"Eating takes time, not that you seem familiar with the idea."  
Adrien didn't have the energy for a joke right now. He relished in the banter initially, even when it meant he had screwed something up or that he lost his claws yet another time and needed a thorough explanation of what he was doing wrong between Plagg shoveling down mouthfuls of smelly chunks of dairy. Now, he couldn't dignify the slightly accusatory joke with an answer. If he did, he'd probably repeat more of the same that he had over the past several hours: that he felt like he needed to be doing something larger for the city burning outside the shop's glass doors, something more effectual than questioning how safe they were in the exposed space, doubting the building's integrity against an absently placed giant foot.  
While his apprehension wasn't going away, he grew tired of being a broken record.  
He could feel the atmosphere in the room shift, though, while Plagg's tone adapted, inexplicably softer and more careful than usual.  
"You might as well try and take care of yourself while we're benched."  
He'd done this a number of times now - soften and propose something that was simple, basic, helpful, and while Adrien appreciated being _considered_ , he also felt increasingly useless; it carried with it impressive meaning that was too wise, too aware of how stressed Adrien was with the weight of Paris bearing on his teenage shoulders. Strong as he was, and durable as the magical armor transforming gave him, he was still overwhelmed. Plagg read him like a book. Like a brochure of cliff notes.  
Even though Plagg stopped calling him 'kid,' when his tone changed like this, no doubt to keep from being condescending when it seemed like it mattered, its absence was glaring.  
"Have you eaten anything since we first confronted Stoneheart?"

Truth be told, he could hardly remember anything between his first approach to the stadium to the current moment, outside of scant pieces of information that he drilled into himself while re-approaching battle, Alya's words that turned from inspiring to a reminder that he didn't know what to do but couldn't just _stop_.  
The hours he expected this to take turned into days, and while Adrien fondly remembered the croissant and macarons a couple mornings prior, he didn't remember eating anything else. As if it wanted to offer an answer of its own, his stomach gurgled uncomfortably and made him feel sick, sending him quickly around the counter towards Plagg to look for something to eat.  
He realized how _hungry_ he felt, and the second his fingers met food, he was ready to take in massive bites and not even mind momentarily choking. Leaving the cheese for Plagg, Adrien went for a slice of turkey. When it reached his mouth, he could feel his hunger ebb just slightly, out of mere anticipation of being full. He could feel the dry firmness of the outermost reaches of the slice of deli meat against the unsavory sliminess of the center, compounded by the room temperature the food had reached.

The feeling of hunger gave way to nausea and a loss of appetite when he realized the food had been out for as long as Stoneheart had terrorized the west-most reaches of the city, possibly longer.  
He doubted the cheese Plagg was burrowing into was any better, and felt dismayed that the kwami needed to eat through subpar, lukewarm, rapidly hardening pieces of cheese just to continue fighting with a complete newbie.  
If he had spent more of his daily life working on meaningful things for this moment in his life, Stoneheart could have been handled. Daily life could have resumed. Ivan wouldn't be a mountain of bulky stone. Kim might just get off Ivan's blacklist. Alya would stop running into danger... Maybe. Adrien could figure out if Tom left their home, find him if he needed, know that he was okay. The military wouldn't currently be trying to suppress or capture the impossible to suppress, the impossible to capture. Plagg wouldn't be scarfing down hardening cheese with ravenous gusto.

He set his head back and reviewed the other options in the room before settling on stale bread, picking off pieces and popping them unenthusiastically into his mouth, slowly circling back around the counter to the window again. From the sound of it, Stoneheart had turned back around and was headed the other direction. Strides grew quieter, rumbles made the world quake less, letting the debris from the shattered road finally settle in place.  
"Maybe take a load off, kid," Plagg urged, muffled behind cheeks full of unpleasant cheese. "I'm gonna be a minute."

Now that he took the first step in cooperating with Plagg's suggestions, Adrien complied much more easily; it was a nearly thoughtless action, plucking up an overturned chair, putting it back on all fours, and sitting. He realized the aching in his muscles, the fatigue in his limbs, and went slack just as quickly. Exhaustion settled in time with the dust of utter inhospitality hazing over Paris, and it took all Adrien had to keep his eyes open.  
He had to come up with a plan.  
Sleep took him quickly, anyway, as he dwelled and recounted the hours before now.

* * *

He'd approached Stoneheart nothing short of excited. His mind was full to the brim with the new facts of life that Plagg had bequeathed unto him, of magic, of destruction in the palm of his hand, of villains, of heroes, of the holder of the Ladybug Miraculous that he was fated to meet, fated to depend on, fated to help, fated to save.  
He was still piecing together how his baton worked, why sometimes it would change form, and yet it didn't have a predictable way to it - it simply changed as was most beneficial at the time, and in retrospect, he imagined it was because of what he thought would help him. He wanted a sword, so it provided him with enough length to suitably weaponize the baton. He wanted ease of transport, so it reverted. He wanted to advance on Stoneheart in a way that his feet alone couldn't accomplish, and since he had the baton in-hand, it grew longer, one end slamming into the ground, the other still safely in his grasp so he could be sent into the air.  
He had gotten a bit more used to his claws, slicing through his father's boulangerie-patisserie, clawing his way to the ground, leaving similar gashes wherever his fingers dug in. He'd even used them to catch himself on the rooftop when his baton surprised him with flight, but also almost sent him toppling over the other side of the building.  
All in all, he was getting the hang of these things, as much as muscle memory could learn over the course of a few minutes of sprinting across Paris and occasionally running into unexpected saving graces.  
He still had his wits about him when Stoneheart had begun to scale the stadium walls, audibly pondering where Kim was hiding, if he was among the citizens that had fled there, when people within promptly erupted into screams, when people poured out of every possible escape from the stadium, save for where it would leave them plummeting to certain death.  
He had made the conscious decision of buying the fleeing people time, buying the Ladybug holder time, when he used his baton to pole-vault himself into the stadium after Stoneheart, head him off, and begin distracting him with one-sided banter and antagonism.

It was when he'd attempted to use his baton, his claws, and finally, his power, on Stoneheart, that he began to lose track of the order or the details of life, when he realized that Stoneheart only grew, unimpeded. Even when the behemoth crumbled under the power of the Cataclysm, he brought himself back up from pieces and piles of stone, larger than ever.  
Adrien repeated these tactics over and over, slamming his baton here and there, attempting to slice through vulnerable-looking joints in the monster's composition, administering his Cataclysm to otherwise mortally wounding sites, realizing only over a few hours that these weren't merely ineffectual, they were exacerbating the situation. Stoneheart emerged larger each time, sturdier, angrier.  
And each time, Adrien had to retreat further. His first transformation back was sheer luck in the boy's bathroom at the stadium while he took a moment to catch his breath, completely irreverent of his ring's beeping over the thrumming of his heart, the rush in his blood vessels, and the lack of oxygen in his lungs. It only took a couple transformations before he had to leave the stadium altogether, as Stoneheart was large enough to step right over the edge of it without issue, and did so.  
It took a full day before he realized the amount of time he had _between_ transformations while Plagg recharged was getting longer, and his time _in_ transformation grew ever-shorter - Plagg remarked that it was a matter of the quality of cheese, the amount of cheese, that he had to his avail, and while Adrien now thought that possible, he imagined at the time that it was just Plagg getting tired.  
So was he.  
Again, hours of nonstop combat did that to you. Magic or no.  
Eventually, Plagg's exhaustion became undeniable enough that the god bemoaned the missing Ladybug.  
Adrien didn't realize he'd stopped looking for them, didn't realize he'd already moved on to think they wouldn't arrive, that he'd have Stoneheart taken care of by then.

He dreamed on, remembering resuming fighting without thinking about the Ladybug, but every once in a while, it felt as though time would suddenly stop just so he could ponder about the Ladybug again, as if Plagg was once again there complaining about where they were.

What if the Ladybug Miraculous was somewhere in one of these destroyed houses, undiscovered, untouched?  
What if the Ladybug Miraculous was on the ring finger of one of the citizens of Paris, trampled under the Stoneheart's mighty weight?  
When he pushed the thought away, the fights resumed.  
And then stopped again as he thought about it once more, a broken record, rinse and repeat, contemplating all the things that could have gone wrong.  
He imagined being the Ladybug holder, still knowing nothing of the kwamis or magic, when Stoneheart overtook the neighborhood, and one slam of the elbow into a building while mid-fight with the Black Cat destroyed their home, taking them with it.  
He imagined being on the street, looking up, unaware of the power-granting gift at home, seeing what looked like a massive rock coming down on their head.  
He imagined being plucked up and inspected, then tossed aside because _they weren't Kim_.  
He only couldn't imagine being Kim, if only because he had no idea where Kim would be, and sure as hell hoped Kim wasn't the promised Ladybug holder.  
But he could imagine the rumbling of incoming steps, increasing in volume, shaking streets.

* * *

The east-facing wall collapsed first, and Adrien woke to the sound of shattering and scattering glass and suddenly crumbling concrete, plus Plagg's urgent and frightened imperatives.  
He didn't process words, but he felt tremors through the ground, heard the building's supports give, saw part of the building already collapsing and moved accordingly. He snatched Plagg from the air, threw himself from his chair, scrambled across the floor, and sprinted for the shop's side door. He was just outside when the deafening slam of a falling Stoneheart sent debris flying, crushed buildings, knocked Adrien from his feet like the world had been swept from beneath him.

The following minute didn't process, nor did the next, or maybe even the one after that.  
He didn't remember where he transformed, or when Stoneheart had gotten back up and noticed the Black Cat holder leaping from rooftops, but when he returned to his mind, that's what his status was: he was a stumbling target in a ruined city, dodging Stoneheart's snatches and punches, minding his footing, and barely calculating the trajectories of mortars he couldn't locate in the flurry of a dynamic battlefield.  
While enough of Paris had been evacuated by now to allow for the use of explosives against the titan, the Black Cat lingered too long around the Stoneheart, never left long enough, never stopped to be escorted out of the city. What little time he did use to address any part of the military was hours before when they had first shown up, and all he had to say was brushed off - he told them that dealing damage to Stoneheart only further empowered the colossus, and yet here they were, showering the monster with bombs, making matters worse than he ever did with a ceaseless bombardment.  
It made Stoneheart taller, wider, his limbs' reach longer.

They were playing a game of cat-and-mouse, Stoneheart and the Black Cat, and suddenly, the Black Cat was losing.  
He felt Stoneheart ever-closer on his tail.  
Even more so when enormous stone fingers curled, closing around Adrien, and he felt his leg barely peel out of reach, his foot being gently crushed.

Adrien hadn't doubted the durability of his god's garb before now, and he wasn't about to. He thought for a full moment that, without transformation, his bones would be dust, pulverized. Instead, it felt as though he had firmly and repeatedly stubbed every single one of his toes.  
It was painful enough, still, that it sent him rolling down the rooftop, footing resolutely lost.  
He caught himself with his claws, and decisively swung himself down to the building's walls, as though it were his own impromptu rock climb, one dangling foot shooting pain through him each time he carelessly smacked it against a window pane or gutter.

Still, Stoneheart made short work of the building separating them, and he found himself once again scaling the building to race down it, regardless of how much it hurt.

He stopped thinking again, merely focused on _escape_. He didn't know how long it would be before his ring next beeped alarms at him, but the last time he had to transform back, he had just shy of two minutes to get away from Stoneheart before the light drained him.  
Now... He began to doubt he would make it to safety, even if he absolutely had to.  
He doubted he could fight in his current state, either.  
He couldn't retreat or concoct any plans, much less turn about and enact one. Each time he stumbled or fell, it brought him too close to Stoneheart for comfort, and the frequency only grew worse.  
Things were looking hopeless.

Until they started looking red.  
The tumultuous atmosphere of fleeing gave way to an aggressive but consistent wind, whipping and swarming just as intensely.  
The sounds of explosions grew ever more distant, like they faded from existence entirely.  
A grip wrapped around him, fast, certain, and inescapable. With a sense of finality, tired eyes closed at the impact that knocked the wind out of his lungs.

The hold on him was impossibly tight, but not crushing; it stole his breath, but it didn't constrict his entire being between rocks and more rocks, hard places and more hard places. While the coil around him was firm, it was unmistakably not the merciless hand of Stoneheart.

Heavy eyelids lifted enough to peer at her, and energy bubbled from his stomach into his throat.  
Black crawled down her neck and gave way to more red with black spots - how far down, he didn't know. He was too busy staring at her face and drinking in the look of concentration she had.  
Her hair was dark, but the light hit it with shimmering blue, giving the impression of midnight, captured in two red ribbons; her eyes were bright blue, giving the impression of an endless day, circled in a red canvas with black spots. The glow of dusk on her cheeks completed the set, and she looked like a full 24 hours that he'd missed, a day he'd forgotten to observe while battling Stoneheart consumed him.  
He struggled with breathing for a minute, but the second he could, his voice came out, dripping with relief and excitement. "It's you!"

The face he was looking up at forfeit all color. Soft indications of pink and red from her complexion yielded into pale, and she almost looked alarmed. Eyes flicked down to him, impossibly wide, and the two heroes' joined pace became rocky and strained.  
She snapped her eyes back up, to the distance, swinging her arm, steadying them again. They were making short work of half a city, peeling away from the battle, leaving too little time for Adrien to even begin to envy her means of locomotion. By the time _Spider-Man_ crossed his mind at the way she cast her arm out and swung low through the streets, they were slowing and arriving at the apex of the Eiffel Tower.

Not as far as he would have run, but he wasn't about to criticize.

"Oh, oh, right," she primed herself, almost too quiet to be heard. She flicked her gaze down to him for a full second, then back to their destination as they gradually rose. "Ssssorry I'm late? I had to..." Nervousness gave way to a mildly spiteful tone. "... Bust out of prison..."

He didn't know what to make of that, and merely stammered out after her, "Prison?"

The color returned to her face with the blooming of an anxious smile, and the highest part of her mask quirked where he imagined her eyebrows overturned themselves sheepishly - but it was hard to really tell. "I wouldn't worry about it if I were you. Based on what I've seen, I think we're on the same team?"

"Depends, what's the name of the team that's trying to stop Stoneheart?"

She seemed to deem it safe enough to finally stop, or decided she was too tired from hauling him the whole way in one arm and one leg and holding the weight of them both in her other arm to continue, as Adrien fell from her grasp and she retracted her rope the second they came level with the platform.  
Or, string, rather. Not rope. Since the thing in her hand was a yo-yo, which she then dexterously wound around her hips like a belt, the round surface of her weapon a mere ornament on her hip.  
A _yo-yo_.  
"I... haven't really thought about it," she answered, bringing him back into their conversation, but he was focused on _her_ , now that they were separated, now that he had the room to breathe, to think, to function.  
She didn't have wings, but she practically flew. She was covered in spots, nearly head-to-toe, only with black taking over under her arms, in lines down the sides of her legs, around her throat, and at her feet. Her hair was pulled back in those ribbon pigtails, which had likely gained volume from being windblown so vigorously; her bangs, too, feathered towards the sides of her face. Invisible while they were flying, he could now see little white spots on either side of her head, bleached sites amid the almost-blue black. While he took in how messy the human parts of her were - the parts that weren't decked with magical armor - he could only imagine what a disheveled mess he looked like. While she definitely wore it well, he thought he must look unusually rabid.  
Maybe this was her usual look, though.  
He wasn't beyond thinking she might be a delinquent, but he also wasn't beyond accepting she might still fight the forces of evil with a staying hand.  
He was brought to again when the Ladybug holder continued, suited fingers fading through messy locks that composed her fringe.  
"Between looking for breaks in security and figuring out a good way to grab you before you were stoned to death, I feel like I had filled my capacity to be creative for a while. Give me a few minutes, and I'll think of something?"

"So you really started a prison-break?" he probed, curiously. Maybe he was a little uneasy, if excited, by the concept of fighting alongside a straight-up criminal gone vigilante. Which, come to think of it, might also make _him_ kind of a criminal. He didn't know what laws there were about their circumstances.

"Something like it," she answered, her own brand of fatigue crossing her face and her shoulders. She surrendered her posture for a slouch in the process.

"Then that's alright. Sounds like we'll make pretty good partners." He grinned at her, and she returned a curious look. He straightened out, rolling his shoulders. "Turns out you were trying to join the fray the whole time, but I spent the past couple days worrying I was the only one who was up to belling the cat."

"Belling the..."  
She appraised him with a critical eye, looking immediately exasperated. Maybe she regretted retrieving him from the battle, saving his life, if it applied - which, he would admit to himself, sounded realistic. But pride surged in him regardless, and he pointed a thumb in the direction of Stoneheart, now a figurine on the horizon.  
"That cat."

She straightened her back once again, her expression stern and solid, in spite of the softness of her complexion. "You can explain the joke more to me later," she answered, once again braced for something serious, and she spoke without her prior exasperation or humility. His grin became milder as he pivoted on one foot to face Stoneheart again.  
He didn't think he had it in him to face off with the titan again. Not really. Even with her there, he wasn't sure they stood a chance.  
Maybe she didn't realize how hard the past couple of days had been while he fought without her, slowly piecing the puzzle together, and it all seemed for naught when the military showed up.  
The conviction in her tone sounded like she could brush the concept of his unending strife to the side.  
He hoped that wouldn't get the both of them killed another two days from now.  
Maybe he also hoped that the Ladybug holder _was_ a criminal who was used to unfavorable odds and conflict and could resolve this quickly so Paris wouldn't remain a practical war zone.  
"Do you know anything about that?"

"Him? Stoneheart?" Adrien's eyes slipped over to her, and she nodded. Eyes still trained on the titan in the distance, she tacked on a "yes" for good measure.  
"Well, first, attacking him is a bad idea. Every time he takes damage, he gets bigger. I've used my power on him a couple of times already, thought it would solve the problem completely, but I realized that wasn't a good idea after, say, the third go?"

"Third?" Her tone was skeptical.

"Yeah, I didn't really piece together that getting back up with a few more feet to him every time I reduced him to rubble was kind of my bad until a couple times in." He paused, realizing that might make him sound incompetent; his hands came up as if in surrender, and while his smile stayed intact, his eyebrows furrowed, his eyes narrowed, and his jaw set. "No judgment, Ladybug, it's harder to see how tall someone is when you still have to look directly up to them."

"It's not that. It's... There aren't supposed to be mulligans, are there?"

"Whats?"

"No re-dos, no consolations for unfavorable outcomes." She slowed down and brought a finger to her chin, thoughtfully murmuring. "My power is supposed to be a one-and-done kind of deal, and I'll inevitably lose the transformation after using it."

"Oh, no, it's the same for me, too. I've just had to transform a few times since Stoneheart showed." Thoughtfully, he regarded the paw print on his ring. "My kwami's kind of pooped, so it's a wonder how I'm still transformed right now." In spite of how he expected at least one of the five green lights to have faded into the black ring's face, unnoticed in the heat of fleeing from Stoneheart before, all of them remained bright. He shouldn't have doubted it, given that their conversation hadn't been interrupted with a ringing reminder that his kwami was about to give up again, but it felt like it had been all too long.

"Did you use your power again?" The Ladybug leaned forward to inspect his ring as well, an eyebrow quirked at the intact face.

"No, it just seems like forty-eight plus hours wears down on you."

"Oh." She withdrew just as quickly as she'd entered his space, hands immediately seeking each other in front of her stomach. Suited fingers fiddled with each other. "Sorry, again, I didn't mean to keep you waiting."  
This time, he leaned into her space and clapped a hand over the Ladybug's shoulder. "No problem, Ladybug. You're here now, aren't you?"

She stared at him for a moment, face frozen, eyes wide, and slowly her gaze shifted to his hand before plucking it from her shoulder. The way she seemed so immediately floored, repeatedly, was all he needed for a moment of comic relief.  
God, he was glad he got another break - a real one - from Stoneheart.  
"Yeah. I'm here now," she murmured, then released his hand and returned her eyes to the titan. "It's good you figured out how he'd gotten so large. Last I saw him, he couldn't level a house with his foot."

Just because she'd separated them from direct contact didn't send him out of her bubble, and he remained close while peering down mere inches at her.  
"You saw him before?"

"Yes. Before lock-down." The conversation lulled, and Adrien began carefully thinking about _where_ she must have been if she'd been locked up immediately after Stoneheart's appearance. Was there a facility nearby? He didn't think so, but he'd also never really thought about it.  
She looked at him again, dispelling his thoughts and taking a step back from him in the same motion. "Have you identified where his akuma is?"

"His... What?"

"His akuma? He should have something on him with the butterfly inside?"  
The way she phrased it made it sound like he should know what she was talking about. For whatever reason, though, he hadn't the smallest clue.  
Maybe it was exhaustion.  
Maybe he wasn't told to begin with.  
Maybe it'd been mentioned at one point, but it floated through his ears in irrelevancy to the imminent danger Stoneheart constantly presented.  
No matter the reason, the Ladybug was looking at him expectantly, and all he could do was offer her as apologetic a smile as he could.  
And she sighed.  
However disheartening that breath was, he kept the subdued look plastered on his face.  
"Do you know anything else about him? Who he is, what his objective is?"

The question was familiar - one he had partially guarded before. If the Ladybug was to take over, though... It was reasonable to share everything he knew. "Yeah. His name's Ivan, and he's looking for a guy named Kim. They were fighting before he turned into... Well. This?" He gestured with both arms to the open air beyond them. "And it looks like he's still got a _stone_ to pick with him."  
She looked at him again, a mix of doubt this time with bewilderment. He almost started laughing. "Sorry, it just slipped out, I'll tone it down a bit."

The Ladybug's eyes stayed glued to him for all of a few moments before returning to the city in turmoil and the villain bearing over it. "... Does Ivan have any physical oddities, something that isn't rock, or at least looks out of place?"

"Nope," Adrien whistled, and finally settled to sit down at the edge of the platform. "That usually indicates a weak spot in games, so I'd have broken it by now if there was. So far, I haven't found anything. The guy's invulnerable."

"Sounds like it," the Ladybug murmured, almost dejectedly. Adrien looked up at her in as much solidarity as he did anticipation, but she didn't meet his gaze. She joined him, letting her legs dangle over the height of the Eiffel Tower, with a gradualness that felt almost apprehensive.  
The look worsened as she whipped her head around, eyes finally settling on the source of a loud whirring that had gained on them - a helicopter that practically meshed into the background for Adrien at this point. He'd acclimated to the military's transports, making it easy for him to keep his eyes on her while she trained her vision on the helicopter, eyes wide, grip fastened on the end of the platform for security. Without the red and black cloaking her hands, her knuckles were probably white from the force behind that grip.  
When the helicopter disappeared into the distance, she returned her gaze to the city far below them, suddenly without the palpable anxiety.  
Maybe it was because the helicopter was gone, or because she wasn't still in the process of trying to sit down.  
Her eyes trailed over the ground below, maybe the buildings beyond, possibly nothing and everything, with a sudden pressure that felt seeking and urgent.  
Finally, as at least a minute ticked by while she appraised the city and he appraised her, that trail led back to Stoneheart, and she spoke again, more stoically this time. "You said those two were fighting - Ivan and Kim. Where?"

He swung his feet, scanning the city for an easy to point out roof, but to no avail.  
While he knew the direction, he wasn't yet used to the aerial view of the city or the particulars of any one building's rooftop - much less the roofless courtyard of his collège. He rose to his feet, to his tiptoes, and finally retrieved his baton from the small of his back where it was clasped.  
"Follow me, Ladybug, and I'll give you the grand tour."

* * *

"So, tell me more about the prison-break?"  
Silence.  
"What'd your kwami think of you being in captivity?"  
Nadda.  
"I couldn't help but notice the lack of ring on your hand..."  
Zilch.  
He turned his head to confirm that he hadn't lost her - she swung a short distance behind him, still wordless.  
She was on his tail the moment he embarked but was beyond conversation over the very _slight_ distance between them. Rather, she seemed steadfastly focused on his back and everywhere she cast her yo-yo.  
Adrien slowed to let her come a little closer, into talking range, but she slowed, too.  
Decisively, he traded swinging and vaulting for running rooftops, and she followed suit. This closed the gap a bit more, slowly, as she moved to join him on the roof, and he attempted conversation again.  
"You doing okay, Mlle. Ladybug?"

Her eyes shot to him, almost as though she was surprised to hear his voice. Maybe she didn't like being called the Ladybug?  
Whatever the reason, the vast range of expressions she so easily displayed for him made it impossible not to chuckle.  
"Ok, how about introductions? You can call me..." And he hummed for a moment; Plagg told him not to share his identity, and while it felt like it may soon prove a moot point, the comical vibes he got from her every jolt made him feel a bit enthusiastic about the potential in playing superhero again. " _Chat Noir_?" He tested the idea, smiled, nodded, "Yeah. Chat Noir. And you?"

Finally, she landed with him on the rooftop, the change in momentum throwing her off-balance. Instinct made him reach to catch her so she wouldn't, oh, plummet from a four-story height, but her quick wobbling brought her back on-track while her yo-yo quickly reeled in.  
"I'm Mar-" He didn't know if her voice merely caught in her throat or if she'd finished the word she'd started - a thunk against the top of his head sent him tumbling forward, and he found her hands reaching to catch him, in turn, while she gasped and he grunted out a somewhat pathetic, "Ouch!"  
While he withdrew from her arms, he could hear her murmuring in frustration, apologies, and small defeated words - few were audible, only half of which was intelligible to him.

He grinned at her in spite of the slight pain from where the yo-yo had smacked his head. "No problem, _Mlle. Maladroit_." She moved one hand over her mouth, like her words had been stolen. "You'll get used to it by the end of the day, promise. I'm still pretty new to this, too."  
He patted his hand on her shoulder and bobbed his head to the side. "Site's right over here." He headed for the collège.

It was familiar and fortunately untouched since he had emerged from the school building the other day - not an overturned vehicle out of place, or any extra, particularly sizable footprints from stone giants forming craters in the road. Even though it might have served as a safe escape after Stoneheart began circling the stadium obsessively, the fact that it was one of the first places that took damages from his tantrum made it feel inherently far from secure. Not a soul in the building, Adrien knew, without even stepping into it. It possessed a unique lifelessness that made it comparatively untouched to the rest of the city on this side of the Seine.  
Its vacancy plus the saturated glow of dusk pouring over the collège's windows gave the building a tranquil look - apocalypse or no apocalypse.

The Ladybug approached the building without taking in much of the site, and he had to remind himself to follow her when she rounded the corner to the front. Expecting she'd keep her steady pace around, he continued observing their surroundings - the destruction in this area of the city was minimal; while the northwest bore the early marks of Stoneheart's rampage, when he turned his gaze to the buildings to the east, it could have looked just like any other evening.  
His reverie was broken when he almost walked into the Ladybug, barely avoiding her by spinning around on one foot - a little move that afforded him none of her attention.  
Her eyes were trained up the entryway stairs into the abandoned collège like there was something there, or this place was dangerous to those who might trespass.  
Adrien peered in over her shoulder, but for all that time they spent staring, he couldn't figure out what she was looking at, what might keep her from heading in.

"Did you see something?" he asked, as quietly as he could.  
She shook her head, and finally began to move to the building. Her steps were slow and deliberate, and she practically froze when her foot first landed on the stairs. Her eyes went down to the step, and all Adrien could imagine she was doing was testing for booby traps.  
He didn't have the time to sort through his mixture of disbelief and hilarity before the Ladybug all but sprinted inside, in spite of all her hesitation and ado before.

He decided that he wanted to see more of that behavior while they perused the school halls, but for every other moment they spent in the building, the Ladybug seemed unfazed.  
They walked together, finding the various indications of Stoneheart's presence, attempting to retrace his steps, and discussing what Adrien had heard the morning that Paris began its descent into chaos; the Ladybug asked questions here and there, but otherwise left him to his recollection and theories.  
Nothing stood out as a possible akuma, nothing sounded like a weakness, and regardless of how much Ladybug thought and probed around it, that fact didn't appear to be changing.  
By the time the two had reached the second floor, the new hero sounded ultimately resigned to the futility of thinking about it.

"I may as well just head his way and see if anything new shows up," she murmured, leading the way as they crossed the courtyard of the school toward the arch at its front. As Adrien stifled a yawn, she tacked on, "Hopefully he's as tired as you are."  
Between the breaking remnants of a yawn in his mouth, he managed a choked and airy laugh. "Maybe, but I wouldn't count on it."  
"Mm," she hummed in response, giving him a once-over. "We've been away from him long enough, we should at least keep an eye on him. Unless you're going to be more of a liability right now."  
He resisted the urge to rub one of his eyes, and felt the swelling of another yawn climbing to his throat. He didn't exactly want to present himself as potentially incompetent, but he wasn't about to follow her right back into battle. Not after two days, not after hearing her voice saturated with the same despairing thoughts that this was above their pay grade, not when Plagg was probably about to release Adrien's transformation any minute now. What could he say?  
Apparently, nothing more than another breaking yawn.

"You should go take a cat-nap, at least," the Ladybug decided. A grin shot across Adrien's mouth, and when his eyes came back into focus after blinking away the haze of fatigue, he saw a pleased smile on her face, too.  
"Y'know, I haven't heard a more compelling suggestion all day?"  
Her smile grew, but her gaze moved to the steps that deposited them back out to the destroyed walkway outside. "Then we better get going before you pass out on the street. I doubt you'll stay transformed in your sleep."  
"Don't worry, you don't have to tell me twice," he chuckled, voice growing thicker with weariness by the second. He reached to the small of his back, feeling for his staff as they met at the mouth of the stairs. He twirled it idly as he tacked on, "I'll hand off the baton to you, then."  
Her smile was exchanged for a forced frown, all too clearly trying to keep the smile at bay as she rolled her eyes. She gestured at the air between them as though she'd actually received a baton, and saluted with the mimed item. "See you, Chat Noir."  
"Toodles, Mlle. Maladroit."  
As he vaulted into the air and easily reached a rooftop, he could hear her shouting after him in a tone he'd like to think was combined with a fit of giggles. "Don't call me that!"  
Her voice subsided quickly, and by the time he turned about to wave to her again, she was gone.  
On cue, his ring beeped aggressively at him.  
He sprinted across the rooftop, found his way down into the abandoned street on the side opposite, and the ring beeped again.  
Not even a full minute later, Plagg released the transformation and whipped away from him in a frenzy, only to tiredly float back to him.

"You held out pretty well," Adrien applauded, offering the fatigued kwami that lay over his shoulder a stroke on the head in appreciation. "It felt like you managed longer with the Ladybug than when we were still fighting Stoneheart."  
"Yeah, don't make it sound like it wasn't in part because of that spring in your step when she showed up," Plagg all but spat - well, for as indignant as he could make himself through the lassitude. "We got our bases covered, anyway, so it was worth working a little longer to have a few hours off."  
"You're telling me."

Adrien tested the patisserie-boulangerie's side door - it was locked, and he didn't know what to make of it.  
Did Tom leave, keeping the door locked just to keep people from breaking in while the town had been largely evacuated? Was there anyone in the city that would do that?  
Was Tom still inside, with the doors locked for safety? Did he think Adrien had been evacuated? Did his father consider the possibility he'd come back without keys?  
His head was swarming with various reasons to feel distress, but he was too tired to bat any of them away.  
"Locked out?" Plagg asked the obvious, and Adrien just nodded, sighing and rubbing his forehead.  
Where should they go now?  
The sun had already set and was sinking into the horizon while darkness crawled over the sky. As dangerous as it could be at times to be out at night, he didn't know if it was worse or better that the city had been evacuated. Were there still shadows skulking about, or had even the most daring of souls fled from the disaster-stricken city? Was there anywhere they could go and definitely find something to feed Plagg and offer a suitable place for them to rest after two and a half days of combat?  
Plagg emanated an annoyed sound, lifted himself from Adrien's shoulder, and vanished into the door; clicking and thudding suggested the deadbolt had been shifted and the knob lock had somehow come unlocked. When Plagg reappeared, the door pivoted ajar.  
"How did you do that?"  
"Magic," he answered, simplistically, in a tone that sounded both like he just didn't want to explain, and also entirely like the truth. Even if it was only the former, Adrien would acquiesce with ease - he didn't have the energy to pry. "Come on, let's get inside. I'm hungry and tired."

Adrien paced in, carefully pushing the door open and glancing around. "Dad?"  
The bakery to the right was silent, and the apartment above was doubly so. Chances were, Tom had gotten out of Paris when he could, expecting Adrien did very much the same.  
He wondered where everyone ended up - what everything was like where they were, how they were getting through their days, if everyone found their families or spent the whole time just as worried as Tom probably was.  
His chest ached at the thought.  
He wandered into the bakery after Plagg, immediately seeking out food from the display cases - definitely stale at this point, but also infinitely superior to what they'd been eating earlier that day. Plagg expressed his frustration that the Dupain family's business was _baking_ , making their collection almost entirely _bread-centric_ but had no issue with accepting a cheese and spinach quiche anyway.  
Adrien inhaled a little bit of everything, only giving up when his stomach began to ache as though it were full to bursting, making climbing the stairs into the apartment a chore in and of itself.  
Instead of making it all the way back to his room, he gave up and fell over the couch in the living room.  
"I should be looking for my dad," he mumbled to Plagg, weary eyes falling on family pictures. "Making sure he's safe. Showing him I'm safe."  
Plagg retired onto Adrien's chest, nibbling at his small, nubby appendages. Maybe there was food left matted in fur that was far too fine for Adrien's fingers to detect when he gave the kwami small strokes of his fingers. "There's a lot of things you could be doing," he answered, taking a break from the search for remnant quiche on his featureless nubs, "But this is what's going to help everything go back to normal faster. The faster Stoneheart is handled, the faster your dad comes back, the faster I get to go back to sleeping all day."  
Sleep. It sounded so enticing.  
He closed his eyes, giving up on petting the kwami that curled up on his chest.

Before he knew it, he was asleep.  
And before he knew it, he was awake.

Night had long fallen, and while Plagg seemed prepared to sleep soundly throughout, Adrien woke with a jolt, eyes scanning his surroundings, jaw tensing as he listened hard to his surroundings and the protest of a kwami that fell from his warm perch onto Adrien's lap, fingers embedding in the couch beneath him for security against a force that didn't come for full minutes after the two's noiseless rude awakening.  
"What was _that_?"  
"Uh..."  
Whatever had caused him to wake up was forgotten - was it distant trembling, was it a noise, was it a nightmare? But he knew with all certainty he expected he'd be thrown into the fray with Stoneheart all over again when he sat up.  
Plagg sighed in resignation and pawed against his ear before floating off while Adrien composed himself again.  
His heart was still pounding in his ears, and he doubted he'd get back to sleep any time soon - even with the black backdrop of the sky outside the windows. It was still night, and unless daybreak was only two hours away, that meant he had gotten a mere fistful of hours of sleep. He wanted to sleep longer, felt like he probably should have, but felt markedly more lucid than he could remember feeling for a long while.  
When the news came on, he settled into the sofa once again. The video feed was dark, too dark, to really tell what was going on. There was no commentary, only whirring and the occasional noise picked up through the camera in use - the dull sounds of explosions and powerful gutteral roars from Stoneheart.  
"Just keeping an eye on things?" Adrien asked as Plagg returned from the remote.  
"Well, I was hoping there'd be something else on."  
"If Paris is in a state of emergency, I don't think we'll be getting a whole lot of cartoons."

They fell into silence as the video persisted, occasionally getting closer, occasionally getting further, but ultimately staying far enough that Stoneheart could fit into the screen entirely.  
"There's your girlfriend."  
"What?"  
"There," Plagg said, and Adrien peered at the screen a little closer. If Plagg meant Alya, she wasn't visible from here - he hoped after he fell back from the front lines that she never managed to make it that close to the conflict again, but he didn't know. "Right there!"  
"Where?"  
"The little speck flying around the big bad?"  
And there she was, flitting this way and back through the video, mostly black in contrast, but the light occasionally hit her in a way that made her suit obviously red - only if you knew to look. "So my girlfriend isn't Alya anymore?" Adrien asked, one brow raised at Plagg.  
"What, you can't have more than one?"  
"Uh... No?"  
"Alright, then no, it's not Alya anymore."  
Adrien rolled his eyes, and they resumed their quiet. Minutes passed, and while Adrien knew better than to expect much from the feed, Plagg stayed vigilant to the television. Adrien, meanwhile, ruminated on everything he could remember about the kwami's magic, about his Miraculous - which, now that he was thinking about it, wasn't much. He felt like he knew what he was doing while he was in the suit, but now that he was out of it, transformed back to normal, rested, not functioning out of habit, it was a blur. He didn't have the energy or the remaining curiosity to ask anything, either.

In the end, it was Plagg that interrupted the silence.  
"If you're done sleeping, it's time to go."  
The kwami gestured to the television, and Adrien felt his gut sink uncomfortably lower. A hand drifted toward the back of his neck, and for the first time, he felt the gross substance of stale sweat dried on his skin, the oil in his hair, the desperate need of a shower. Quietly, skeptically, he asked, "You think we can actually handle him?"  
"If Ladybug showed up before things got this bad, it would have been easier, maybe she wouldn't even have needed us. We could have had it good the whole time, just waiting it out comfortably," Plagg irritably replied, paused, and reprioritized. "The longer you wait, the harder it'll get. So now that you're both out and you've recharged, let's get this done, I'm ready to hibernate in a whole box of cheese quiche when it's over."  
Adrien didn't process the whole of Plagg's response, trying and failing to focus on small bits that sounded _off_ to him. When repeating the words to himself didn't work, he resigned and moved to his feet.  
"We can go in a few minutes, I'm gonna take a quick shower. There's more quiche downstairs if you want it before we go."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm hoping to have the Stoneheart part of this story wrapped up in 3-4 more chapters, but I'm not sure how that will play out as more opportunities to explore facets of the story show up.
> 
> I've noticed I've had a few errors in prior chapters, so I may be amending them a bit soon, depending on how it all lays out. They won't be _immensely_ major, though.
> 
> A few curveballs in this one!  
> First, the obvious - where Alya urging Marinette in canon has to be parallel to this universe (where she encourages Adrien) plus...  
> Well, someone completely evil planted the concept of Alyadrien in my mind, and I loved it. I decided it would have its day in this fic, if only fleetingly, while Alya and Chat get to flirt.  
> The other primary curveball is going to be recurring, but I don't really want to outwardly state this early on. Feel free to guess as to what it is!
> 
> As always, don't forget to leave a comment/kudos and/or subscribe!


	5. A Purple Butterfly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stoneheart: Resolved. Hopefully.

If he could have chosen, Adrien wouldn't have gone back out - not any time soon, anyway.  
The initial onslaught in the wake of Paris' destruction was enough to keep him back. After all, he had been playing an active role in handling the colossus, struggled all the while, with no hope of making up for his numerous failures.  
Failures that wouldn't stop piling up.  
Then there was how _tired_ he felt. His energy had been gone for days, but he ran on empty regardless until the Ladybug turned up.  
He'd been in bad places before, but this one topped them all: for once, he was the one who everyone looked to and expected great things from, and he fell impossibly short. He tried, failed, and got up so many times his whole body ached from it.

Returning wasn't something he did eagerly, but out of obligation.  
Plagg was there, telling him it was time to go. That the Ladybug could use, no, possibly needed the Black Cat's help.  
Refusing almost didn't feel like an option, and while he could play the many things that could go wrong in his head forever, he was too tired to. He just wanted this to be over.

If nothing else, though, knowing he would arrive and the Ladybug would be there, waiting for him, anticipating him, ready to shoulder this with him, ameliorated the whole debacle of Stoneheart's ceaseless rampage... just a little.  
Just a little was enough to let the trepidation melt off of him.  
For the first time in a while, he felt eager about his role as a superhero.  
Even if Paris would be lost, or he was fated to keep up the fight until _someone_ thought up something better to do about Stoneheart, he had a partner. He wasn't alone in this. Seeing another person didn't mean he needed to stress as much for their safety.  
Soon, like him, they would acclimate to the demands of the job.  
Even if life was never the same again, there was a chance someone would understand what he was going through completely.  
The thought brought a giddiness to him that almost felt uncomfortable, but it did nothing to stop his exuberance. He was ready for Stoneheart, for whatever was to come.

Including a familiar blur striking across his vision in the distance, a little further south than he'd been heading.  
While the blur was nowhere _near_ where Stoneheart should be, he knew with absolute certainty who it was, and could hazard a guess as to why she was so far from her post.

The night was thick, dark, and still, as he approached the other hero's trajectory. He was on the neighborhood she'd been swinging across within the minute, but she seemed to vanish into thin air; surely she was still somewhere nearby. All he could base his idea of her whereabouts on were motions and noises in the barely-lit late hours, so he watched and listened, craning his neck over the end of the building he perched on as though it might help.

What sounded like an argument from the street below reached him, and drew him in.  
As he predicted, there was the Ladybug, thoroughly incensed by one Alya Césaire.

"... of a little publicity?"  
"It's not the publicity I'm concerned about. This zone is off-limits to civilians."  
Alya's voice sounded critical. "Yes, you're a superhero, and I respect your authority in supervillain matters, but you technically _count_ as a civilian - I support you, but I'm not being hauled out without answers!"

"Trespassing again?"  
The ongoing debate broke off at his interruption when he fell to the ground near them. He answered both familiar faces with a little grin, twirled his staff over his fingers, and rested it behind his neck, a bridge connecting his shoulders. A few paces closed what distance he had from the duo, and he formally entered reasonable conversation space during the breath it took for the girls to acknowledge him.

"You're back!" Alya answered, tone taking on an odd bit of humility.  
"Thanks for the warm welcome, Mlle. Césaire," he answered, then glanced to the Ladybug and back to the civilian in their midst. While Alya seemed a bit exasperated before and the Ladybug seemed consumed in a contained aggravation only seconds before, they both transformed immediately for the better.  
Alya's arms went from a sturdy hammock crossed over her chest to two pillars at either side of her torso, hands reaching her shoulder height - both were balled up as if in fists, but one was clutching a familiar black phone. "Someone's in a good mood!" she observed, a grin developing over her previously argumentative expression. "If I can't come close, I'm willing to compromise a bit again. Any updates on Stoneheart? This one," she started, her thumb leaving her fist to jab in the Ladybug's direction, "is _so_ tight-lipped."

Adrien's eyes slipped toward the Ladybug, who looked at him with as much an exasperated expression as it was an amused one. He couldn't help but grin in return as if this was some joke between only them. Masked partners had their perks. "Is everything confidential now?"  
"Somewhat," she answered simplistically, rolling her eyes over the abyssal heavens above them. "It seemed like a bad idea to release _speculation_ to an unfiltered news medium, in my opinion. Nothing against the blog, but even filtered outlets can have problems. We wouldn't want anyone getting hurt through misinformation."  
Solid, critical words, but she spoke so perfectly pleasantly.

Alya took a pace toward Adrien, taking the spotlight again. "I get that, I do. But the people _want_ answers. They're scared and concerned and want to know what's going on and how it's being handled!" The unmasked girl flitted her eyes over to the Ladybug before returning to lobbying him. "You shared information before. The fact he was getting bigger. The fact he's searching for something, possibly someone. That transparency was a _good_ thing because we have many more people working together to discover what his motivation could be."  
"Those are entirely already public information from the fact the Stoneheart was literally searching through people and buildings, but doing little to _attack_ anyone aside from picking them up. There's a reason the casualties are still zero. And the fact he used to be roughly human-sized but can now treat monuments like chairs is another dead give-away."  
"They weren't at the time. The people of Paris need to _prepare_ for what's to come, not play it by ear while things are happening!" Convincing. Compelling. Alya had already secured him on her side.  
"The information you were asking for can be unconfirmed, speculation, or completely unhelpful to be shared with the population," Ladybug countered, the vague hilarity in her tone slowly becoming far off and forgotten. She was tired again, and his persisting silence probably wasn't helping either girl work through their clearly indestructible impasse. "Stoneheart's identity, motivations, abilities, so on, wouldn't be anything the population could use that wouldn't potentially put that information in risky hands. If by some chance we knew his identity, that may put a target on unaffiliated people's backs."  
"Or _affiliated_ people."  
"It's not our business to disclose that. There's not exactly a precedent here, but my piece is this: you know where he is, what he's doing, and what danger he poses. You know where the safe zones are. That's good enough for now."

They were _both_ good. How the Ladybug anticipated the importance of confidentiality was beyond him, and while he had been careful earlier on, he would fall through his argument in a minute, flat, if Alya truly pressed for details like she did now. She would have him crumbling and laying out everything, and who knows where the information would have gone? What would have been done with it? He didn't know where it could go, but he felt like Ladybug might have an idea. Before any irreparable damage was done, do damage control. Carefully pick how to handle things. Besides - she had said _for now_.  
"Hmmm," he hummed, positioning his thumb and forefinger over his chin, and while he hated to admit it, he did have to pick a side for them to get through this. "Yeah... I'll have to agree with Ladybug on this one. It's better safe than sorry, and if Paris' citizens have been evacuated or relocated to safe zones, that's safe." The Ladybug was sated, but Alya's face fell further into discontent. "How about you, Mlle. Césaire? Still sticking around to get the word out?"  
She crossed her arms again and stood her ground. "Yes. About the supervillain _and_ our new superheroes. So if you don't have anything to say about Stoneheart, what do you have to say about yourselves? To help put everyone at ease? Are there more of you coming?"

"What do we have to say..." Adrien started, considerately, putting his weight on his heels and bobbing his upper body forward. He looked to the Ladybug, unsure if he should answer or what a risk that could pose, and she answered monotonously.  
"That we're goal-oriented and don't have a whole lot of time for an interview right now."  
Adrien immediately laughed. "If it's about keeping an eye on the big guy, I don't think we have to worry about losing track of him anymore."  
"It's not really that..." The other hero tapered off, then looked at Alya. "Anyway, if you're going to ask similar questions about us, the answer is no. Our identities are secret for good reason, and the details of our abilities are our business. All you really need to know is that we're here and will be handling the situation."

"Such a stick in the mud," Adrien chided, grinning enormously at her. She had some sense of urgency that he couldn't line up with, not anymore, not now that he had accepted the high probability that they wouldn't win this fight. At the same time, he wasn't sure he minded it as much as he did a few hours ago. Funny.  
The hilarity was slightly lost on him when his eyes darted over the civilian with them, who looked increasingly frustrated with the lack of information she was receiving. They had to give her a bone, or she wouldn't give them an inch, much less make it easy to carry her across the city. He looked at his partner again, formulating a new tactic - hopefully, one to satisfy both girls. "Sure, we're keeping our identities secret, but maybe what she's curious about is getting an introduction to us _as heroes_?"  
The Ladybug gave him a far more defeated expression, and she sighed. Once again, she slouched, and it seemed like such an alien action to her body that his bubbling snickers couldn't be suppressed.

Alya cleared her throat, a content, sly smile spontaneously across her face, a glimmer in her eyes. It seemed like he met her quota - now, it was just a matter of the Ladybug following through with him. "Not that I want to interrupt this cute moment, but that sounds like my cue to accept the consolation prize. Superhero introductions will work. For now."

"Chat Noir," Adrien immediately answered. "The Black Cat, obviously, and I destroy everything I touch." Stealthily, he moved a hand forward and tapped Alya's phone. When she noticed his finger poised over the end of her device, she jerked her own hand back to protect it and inspected it to ensure it remained intact and functional. When she found nothing wrong with it, she howled with laughter.  
"You almost gave me a heart attack!"  
He turned his grin on the Ladybug, a look he could only assume Alya replicated, because the masked girl looked like a deer in headlights for all of a second. When she didn't answer, he urged her with a "Ladybug?"  
He didn't know her name, what she'd chosen to go by, and it was all that he knew to call her. Alya took it and ran with it.  
"So, Chat Noir who destroys stuff and Ladybug who...?"  
As Ladybug sighed and considered her response, their conference was interrupted by a guttural roar. "A Ladybug who needs to purify that akuma," she finally muttered when the roar fell quiet, casting her yo-yo up and away. He couldn't really see where it went in the dark. "Chat, can you get her out of here? Just join me when you're done."  
She jerked down on the yo-yo's string and was whisked away, turning into a blur in the night again.

"Don't worry about her, she's kind of..."  
"Goal-oriented?" Alya joked, pulling a laugh from him. "You know, you were pretty urgent, all-business, little-talking before, too. Don't think this ruined my impression of her."  
"Good! Now, as the lady said, we're gonna get you out of here again. This time, would it kill you to stay away?"  
"As a matter of fact, it would." She circled him and put her arms around his shoulders while he knelt to the ground. He just shook his head, and when Alya gave him an affirmative pat on the shoulder, he vaulted for the rooftops again.  
"You seem a lot more level-headed now that Ladybug's here. Were you so frazzled the other day because you were worried about her?"  
Maybe it was that, or the weight of Paris and Stoneheart on his shoulders. Plus a certain teenage journalist that wouldn't stop running right into danger. Maybe all of that combined and lack of sleep was beginning to stress him out. While the reasons were endless, none of them would really do; presenting a weakness for a superhero was never a good thing. Instead, he just sighed, his voice almost a chuckle. "You ask a lot of questions."  
"It's just the reporter in me. Besides! You answer a fair amount of them. It gives me life, waters my inquisitive mind-crops, clears my suspicion-acne, and fuels my interrogation."  
"Good point. But I think I'm going to keep my lips zipped on this one, too. Not until Ladybug says otherwise."  
"I see which of you wears the spandex pants in the relationship," she teased.  
He wasn't about to dignify the suggestion with affirmation or refutation - only a technicality would do, he decided after a few moments of quiet. "Well, I think mine are kind of more like leather? And I don't know, maybe hers are, too. Then, neither of us wears the spandex pants."  
"So you don't deny that you're in a relationship?" the reporter probed.

Oh.  
That's the real scoop she was vying for.

"I'm pretty sure we're not. If Ladybug says something different, mind letting me know?"  
"I wouldn't miss the chance to play celebrity matchmaker, Chat Noir. You'll be third to know."  
"Third?"  
One of Alya's arms unwrapped from his shoulders, compromising her perch a bit, but visually displaying the count for him. With each person, a finger came up. "Well, Ladybug, for one. Then me, if I'm going to tell you about it. That makes you..." The third finger rose. "... Third."  
"Boy, am I bad at math and basic, common sayings."  
"That's why you have friends to correct and judge you."  
Their laughter filled the rest of their journey across the Parisan skyline.  
Adrien finally slowed down when they approached Collège Françoise Dupont, depositing her on the sidewalk and re-securing his baton on the small of his back in its clasps.  
"Doesn't look like Stoneheart's been here for a while. Also, I'd appreciate it if you gave me a while before you came back out."  
"Not delivering me all the way to the edge of the city this time?"  
"I'd like to, but I've got a feeling Ladybug's feeling a little stood up right now. Not that you're not pretty, but I've got a prior _planned_ engagement to get out of the way."  
Alya scoffed and swatted at him. "Please, I'm not interested in dating anyone that has a _fursuit_."  
"A," he sputtered and felt tears welling in his eyes as he choked on his breath. "A fursuit? This isn't a fursuit."  
"Uh-huh." Alya's voice was dripping with sarcasm and skepticism. "Not to mention you're literally running everywhere in the city with it on. Shamelessly!"  
When his cackles finally subsided, she continued. "If it helps, I do need to charge my phone, so... See you in a couple hours, then, Chat Noir."  
"Thanks for the heads up," Adrien managed, nodding, and still hardly above laughter over the allegation. "Oh, and, uh... Take your time coming back, really. I'm going to need at least thirty extra minutes to recover from that shade."

* * *

_I don't think we have to worry about losing track of him anymore_ , he had said, an actual fool.  
He wasn't even away from the Ladybug for _ten minutes_ , and when he reached the Parc des Princes again, Stoneheart was nowhere to be seen. There were no tremors of his steps, nothing.

Had she taken care of him in that short amount of time? What had kept her those hours preceding now? Did she almost have him vanquished when Alya turned up, and only had to put off the rest of the battle until the rogue citizen was returned to safety?  
But shouldn't she have been somewhere nearby so he could meet with her and figure out what they were going to do next? So she could tell him that their troubles were over and Stoneheart had been defeated?

Minutes ticked by as he settled onto the ruins of the stadium. He wasn't sure where to go, but if Ladybug had timed out and needed to run to transform, the best thing he could do would be sitting and waiting to be found.  
All he had while he waited was his imagination and the whistling wind against an otherwise noiseless background.  
No life crossed the streets of the city during this turmoil, which was a surprise to no one: but it struck him that the military transports were gone, too.

Did they just decide to pack up as soon as Ladybug took Stoneheart out? Didn't anyone have any questions? Was life really so simple that there wouldn't be any repercussions for the destruction of a city and the appearance of not one, not two, but _three_ supers in such a short timeframe in such a small area? Did they get some amount of amnesty simply because everyone's lives had been uprooted but could slowly return to normal?  
He doubted security mattered so little that it could be traded for a construction company to come in and restore the entire city, regardless of lost revenue from the loss of a tourist gem.

His questions and hypotheses came to a halt at the familiar roar emanating over the horizon; against the dark space of the ground, Adrien couldn't make any outlines or silhouettes out, but at least he knew about where Stoneheart had vanished off to.

Even though the Eiffel Tower's nighttime illumination wasn't present in the vast dark, it remained the sole completely identifiable feature on the horizon as he approached the sound - while he couldn't place Stoneheart's roar with definition, it seemed like a good starting point.  
And a good destination.  
By the time Adrien had crossed the kilometers separating the Parc des Princes and the Eiffel Tower, Stoneheart was approaching it with slow, strong steps.  
He slowed down, and questions and curiousity finally caught up with him. What was Stoneheart doing this far northeast? On the _wrong side of the river_?

He perused the area, keeping his distance so he wouldn't be noticed and suddenly be chased. He needed space and time to figure out what Stoneheart was after, where he was going. He needed to predict it, work in anticipation of it. He knew that.  
He imagined Stoneheart climbing the world-renown tower, but for what purpose?  
While the area was without blemishes for the most part, what merit did additional destruction have?  
When Stoneheart merely passed it by, Adrien raced to pass him to the Trocadéro; so he wasn't seeking a vantage point, or merely trying to destroy what was around him or what looked important.  
Had his objective moved? How did he know? How was he supposed to guess what Stoneheart was after?  
He needed someone to bounce ideas off of; he needed to know what Alya's viewers thought, what Alya thought, so he could work from there. If only Ladybug had accepted releasing more information...

Suddenly, and far more harrowing, the question crossed his mind: where was the Ladybug? She had traveled to the back of his mind out of sheer familiarity with her absence: he had been alone in this for so long, her being away felt like the norm, and she was quickly forgotten; but suddenly, fear of what had happened consumed him.  
Was she safe? What had happened while he was gone? Was her absence the reason why Stoneheart was so far from where he was supposed to be? Was what happened to her the same thing that happened to the military transports?  
And he was off doing who-knows-what. Joking about fursuits and dating. Because he knew this whole fight was useless and had resigned to that nihilism, rolled with whatever came, and didn't _tell her_ this was a fruitless endeavor and to be extremely careful.  
Despair gave way to agitation at the giant lumbering across the Seine.  
Alone and seeking, with no one to snatch at, no one throwing bombs at him, nothing to fight in this space.

It happened in a flash; he changed directions, releasing his anger in a shout while he flicked across the sky. His staff converted into a weaponizable length in his hands, and he swung with all his velocity, all his anger, onto Stoneheart, knowing it was pointless, counterproductive, even, but he was _tired_ and _resigned_ , and didn't expect anything. His strike wouldn't help him at all, he wouldn't face a sudden, improbable victory, he wouldn't find Ladybug.  
He also didn't expect Stoneheart turning and noticing in time to counter his strike, or a yo-yo string wrapping around his own thorax and jerking him away from the colossus.

He felt Stoneheart match gazes with him while he was jerked across the sky, but surrendered that look to seek where he was going to land: a small figure stood there, unwavering, beyond the cone hedges, barely visible in the moonlight and breaking the symmetry of the landscape with the pose of jerking the line she'd cast out to him.  
It was all he could do to watch Ladybug slowly grow as he flew closer, his own face splitting into a relieved smile while her expression turned from powerful and resolute into realization; she braced herself all too late when they collided and both were sent rolling across the pavement in unison to the start of a sky-shattering roar.

"Welcome back," she all but groaned, pulling herself up from the ground and holding her head. To his relief, neither of them were dead _or_ sporting new, egregious wounds.  
"Nice to be back, Ladybug," he answered, managing to grin in spite of the low ache crossing his entire body. It took them a few seconds to recollect themselves and move to their feet before he continued. "So, uh- what's he doing all the way over here?"  
"He followed me here," she answered, removing her eyes from her partner and resuming her vigilance on the colossus. "It wasn't hard to get his attention, and considering how quickly he moves with just a couple steps, I'd say we made pretty short work of our walk. New world record, maybe?"  
"He might be disqualified because of his height."  
"Ah... You know... You're probably right."  
"But, hey, you're pretty short, and you even managed to keep up with him. _You_ could always give the world record a try."  
"I might consider it, but I don't think any of us are eligible. I appreciate the thought."  
Silence settled over them for a moment, letting the joke expire as it lingered unanswered in the air between them; Ladybug disrupted this nothingness with a motion to follow her as she turned on her feet and headed further down the square-marked courtyard. Stoneheart had recentered on them and resumed his pursuit already, and was closing in quickly.  
While they ran, Adrien rekindled their conversation. "My question was really... What did you bring him here for?"  
"There were too many variables at the stadium."  
"Variables?"  
"The explosions, Mlle. Césaire, etc. I knew I could shake her if we relocated because she doesn't have a view of the skyline, and I wanted to spread the military thin to keep them from interfering. After all, you were right."  
"Right? About?" was all he could think to ask at the moment. He was a little amazed by her initiative and the decisions she'd made - he always brought Alya away from the conflict, never thought of uprooting and replanting the conflict somewhere Alya didn't predict to try and better secure her safety, to keep himself from repeatedly retreating just to answer the occasional question. The military he had simply _accepted_ and didn't think of trying to shake.  
He only noticed how his thoughts had consumed him when Ladybug grabbed him by the waist and hauled him to a rooftop. She blew out a puff of air. "Didn't sleep enough, Chat Noir? You're still a million miles away."  
"Whoops, my bad. I'm on earth now, hello."

She released them before resuming her practical flight across the city, stumbling here and there, cursing and recovering quickly.  
"I was just saying - you were right about damage, and since it seemed those in charge weren't about to cooperate, I decided to take their target away from the shooting range. They were making him bigger by the second, and I don't exactly want to spend as long as this as you already have. Not now that I know where his akuma is and have you back in play."  
His neck hurt from how quickly his head whipped around to look at her; the sheer force of it almost sent him tumbling in her style. "You did?"  
She nodded; his smile got so wide it _hurt_.  
"It's in his hand. Another thing you were right about is that he doesn't have any physical anomalies. No gems, grooves in the rocks, or anything that seems even slightly organic. But his fist... He never opens it. If the stones are impenetrable, the key to defeating him is getting him to open his hand. Either the anomaly is on his palm, or he's _carrying_ it."

Adrien glanced at Stoneheart again, stumbling, tripping, and surrendering speed in order to turn and run backward so he could analyze the villain critically. Two and a half days, and he hadn't noticed the giant's unopening hand. Two and a half days, and he hadn't somehow tricked the giant into opening his hand, either. Now that he knew what he was looking for, though, it felt so obvious.  
"You're incredible, you know that?" He spun around, hastily gaining on her again, meeting her impossibly wide eyes as they were cemented on his face and grabbing her for the jump between buildings so they wouldn't lose momentum or fall from the height. To spare her the definitely ensuing quiet, he added, "Ok, what's the plan then?"

Her voice came out as wobbly as her stance as she regained her footing on the other side of the gap between roofs - she glanced back toward Stoneheart, struggling to get through the buildings like them, giving them a moment to talk. "Well... I'm working on that. I don't really know what all we have available to us. You'd mentioned your power, but I'm not certain about what it does, since... It destroys things, but he's still intact."

"Well, it seems like it destroys everything but him. When I used it on him..." He looked down into his open palm, then over to the titan. Time and time again, he had inadvertently made Stoneheart impossibly bigger with the power of destruction. In retrospect, maybe he should have guessed it didn't work the way he wanted after the first time. "I guess he fell to pieces? All of his rocks scattered, but he got up in a minute. Just like the bombs, though, I'm pretty sure that counts as damage."

She stayed quiet, eyes drifting from him to stare into the distance, possibly at the ground somewhere, with one finger thoughtfully curled over her lips. "I think... Ultimately... Our plan will depend on getting everything wrapped up before he pulls himself together."  
Ladybug became quiet again, seconds turning to a minute. He could hear the approaching ground transports and grew anxious for her explanation, for her decision. She didn't regard the helicopters whirring around the titan for a second.  
With some finality and sudden confidence and certainty, she addressed him. "Ready to try and speed through this?"

"Uh... Maybe?" He laughed, growing a little sheepish under the intensity of her own preparedness and assurance. Her smile elicited a final, "Yeah, I'm ready when you are."

She turned on her heels, pointing off to the distance like she was indicating their destination. For all the years he'd spent in this city, he had no idea where she was pointing. "Follow my lead, alright Chat Noir?" With that, she sprinted off.

"Sure," he laughed before chasing after her.

* * *

To keep their distance from the incoming "variable", they led Stoneheart even further into the northeast. The heroes swung over buildings and sprinted across rooftops, and while Stoneheart was hot on their heels with his slow but long pace, the transports that were trapped on the streets had to weave around them.  
The second they had a large enough space for Stoneheart's pen - not hard, given the numerous wide, open spaces that were afforded to most of Paris' monuments - they put Ladybug's still totally unexplained plan in action: Ladybug wove her yo-yo around Stoneheart, immobilizing him, and by treating his arm essentially as the pulley to throw himself off balance as he reached to snatch her, he fell to the ground, useless.  
As Ladybug ran for his other arm, she shouted for Chat's Cataclysm.  
When Stoneheart fell once more to pieces, she sifted through the stones, throwing boulders aside, only finally stopping when she'd uncovered an oddity among the rest: a purple rock that, when picked up, cracked like an egg in her hands.

Adrien had spent two and a half days waiting for Ladybug, and Ladybug spent six hours waiting for him. While they had been good at gathering information with what time they had, neither made any headway in the true defeat of Stoneheart on their own.  
And yet five minutes with one another, working in tandem, uninterrupted by the outside world, had Stoneheart dissolved into a regular human again. A purple butterfly escaped into the night.

Plagg was right - she needed him, and he needed her. Neither could have finished the task without the other.  
Something about the sentiment of mutual necessity felt so...  
Invigorating? Exhilarating? Liberating?  
When the rubble cleared and he had a clear route to Ladybug, he sprinted for a hug. It felt _right_ until she dove out of the way.

"C'mon, Ladybug! One, to celebrate our victory."  
"One what, tackle?"  
"Yes, I'm going to tackle you."  
"I don't think so," she refuted, cheeks full and her smile enormous while somehow still hiding her teeth.  
"Well...! What do you want to do then? I don't know about you, but I'm thrilled. I'm even excited about going to school tomorrow. Maybe. Actually, maybe not. I might sleep through literally all of my classes..."

His decision was interrupted by a beep from his ring. Right. It'd gone off twice, now, so far apart that he felt like they spanned entire hours. He curled his fingers in and looked at the face of his ring, confirming the remaining three pieces of the neon green paw pad - a paw pad that disappeared under the red knuckles of Ladybug's suit, who gently pushed their fists together.  
"How about that?"  
It felt like his ears were wiggling as Adrien smiled at her through pale eyelashes and perked his head back up to face her properly. "Purrfect, Ladybug. And by the way..." He pushed his knuckles against hers a little more firmly. "Nice job."  
She reciprocated, smiling ever-wider. "Nice job, Chat Noir. But you better get going."  
Adrien sighed, too _happy_ to sound really disappointed that he had to split. "Don't want to expose my secret identity."  
"Nope."  
Another beep caught his attention - already? they seemed so separated before -, and he quickly backed up, reaching to the small of his back to grab his baton, and turning on his heels to flee. "Let's do this again sometime soon!" he called over his shoulder.

Even as he listened for her response, he couldn't hear one. He didn't linger, knowing the transports would be arriving any moment, compromising the nearby area as a reasonable place to transform back to himself.  
He aimed for speed, and only when the final piece of the pawprint threatened to vanish from the face of his ring, did he allow himself to land and roll into the safety of an alleyway; Plagg separated from him at long last, and Adrien reached to catch him before setting the kwami on his shoulder.  
"Finally," Plagg whined, "it's over! Finally! I can go to sleep..."  
"Before breakfast? It's probably almost morning."  
"I finished all the quiche before we left, there's nothing, and I'm as tired as I am starving!"  
Adrien could only grin. The victory instilled an impossible amount of energy in him. He felt as excited as he felt generous in the moment. "Okay, you take a nap. Since it looks like I have the boulangerie to myself, I'll make you another quiche when we get back."

The kwami burst with energy and jerked upward to match Adrien's eyes, tiny stubs of paws buried in his shoulder. "Really?!"  
"Yeah, really."  
"Yeeeees!" Plagg dropped against Adrien's shoulder again, lazing and sprawling, eliciting a snicker from his human. "Do that. Actually, since I've been working so hard this whole time, how about enough that I can _hibernate_."  
"Well..."

It was one way to celebrate, anyway.


End file.
